Undergraduate Admissions
Alabama American Legion Boys State on UA Campus
From June 10 through June 16, The University of Alabama hosted the 70th annual Alabama American Legion Boys State session. The participants, nearly 600 soon-to-be high school seniors, were chosen based on leadership, hard work, strong morals, and motivation in the classroom and the community.
Boys State is an opportunity for these students to form new friendships, take part in a model government, and meet and hear from a wide array of Alabama leaders. The boys can also choose from a number of interest groups, including law enforcement academy, engineering academy, and environmental interest group.
"The key concepts at Boys State are citizenship and leadership," said Yancy Mitchell, a Boys State volunteer and former Boys Stater himself. "Even if you're not on the city council, you still want to be a good citizen."
When they arrived on campus, the boys were randomly placed into 12 different cities. City governments were elected and formed, and by the midpoint of the week, these municipalities had worked together to form county governments and then a state government.
But Boys State is not only about electing the government. The rest of the week was spent working to pass laws and get things done.
Bryan McMeen will be a senior at Grissom High School in Huntsville this fall. He served as Deputy Attorney General of Alabama at Boys State and says the experience taught him a lot about the role of the Attorney General's office.
"I had a multi-faceted role that fluctuated between an advisory role to other politicians, including the Governor, on my opinion of the legality of proposed bills, and a political role where I actually composed bills that were important to me," McMeen said. "I learned that anyone can write legislation, the challenge is getting politicians to support it."
Jay Morris, from Spain Park High School in Hoover, said Boys State gave him a better understanding of the pressure politicians are under.
"There are many hot topics out there in the world," Morris said. Politicians have to make the hard decisions on how to handle these issues.
Boys State is a program of the American Legion, and this year was the first time the event had been held on the UA campus since the early 1980s.
"The University of Alabama is an impressive school with an influential background in law and political science," McMeen said. "I left Boys State with a great respect for the University of Alabama."
For more information on Alabama American Legion Boys State, visit alboysstate.org.