FINAL EXAM – worth 60 points: This assignment is designed to familiarize you with your representatives in the United States Congress—both in the Senate and the House of Representatives. You will gain insights into who represents you at the federal level, what their policy platforms are, and how they have voted on recent key issues. This will also allow you to engage with government and understand the impact of your representatives on both a national and state level, and encourages critical thinking about the alignment between a politician’s stated beliefs and their legislative actions. Please read all instructions thoroughly.
ASSIGNMENT:
Identify your current representatives in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. Use your home state of CALIFORNIA.
Use house.govLinks to an external site. and senate.govLinks to an external site. to find out who your representatives in Congress are. You will need to enter your ZIP code or state to locate them.
Research and summarize the political platforms of each representative.
Visit each representative’s official website to gather information about their policy platforms. Focus on at least two key issues that each representative emphasizes in their agenda.
You can also consult their social media profiles, interviews, and any recent press releases to understand their positions better.
Analyze their voting records on recent major legislation.
Use resources like GovTrack.usLinks to an external site. or Congress.govLinks to an external site. to find detailed records of how your representatives have voted on recent major bills. Choose at least two significant votes from the past year to highlight.
Summarize your findings. Here are some prompts to help:
Who are your representatives in the House and the Senate? Include your thoughts on if you think your representatives understand the significance of their roles.
Review the bills voted on and highlight their major legislative votes and analyze whether their voting behavior aligns with their public positions, platforms, and party lines.
Reflect on what you learned about the political process and representative democracy through this assignment, and any insights you gained about the importance of being an informed voter.
Submission Requirements
Compile your findings into a report of a minimum of 700 words.
Please enter your submission via Word document or PDF file.
You do not have to include citations in-text, but please include a page at the end with a list of the sources you used (not a part of your minimum 700-word count).
