These Seaman High School students dove into civics and ended up Kansas state champions

Being an active participant in one's government is a vital part of being a good citizen.

That's the strong belief of the Seaman High civics team, and it lifted them to winning the championship title of the Kansas Civics Games.

Four Seaman students — Sidney Chinn, Jeremiah Moylan, Reece Mumford and Kylie Weir, all juniors — dove into the subject when their teacher Rick Rineberg came across information about the statewide civics competition.

The civics games are broken up into three parts: a civics project presented before the game, a quiz and a debate presentation.

On April 4, the team won against 18 other teams, claiming a $4,000 prize that was split between the four members.

Practice, practice, practice

Moylan said the team practiced a ton leading up to the competition. They used quizlets and mnemonics for the majority of their studying.

Rineberg said the team even came into school when classes were out of session for parent-teacher conferences so they could study together.

As part of the competition, the team had to build and present a civics project that would impact the local community. They chose to address the lack of affordable housing in the area.

"We tried to put forward a plan that would encourage developers to come in and build houses that are affordable for people in the Topeka area," Moylan said.

They interviewed local and state representatives to help build their project. The idea was to provide tax incentives to developers who build and maintain low income properties.

Rineberg said watching them work so hard was inspiring.

"I try not to be the stereotypical football coach and social studies teacher, but they definitely inspire me to keep learning and they are some good kids for sure," Rineberg said.

Students explored civics after curiosity was piqued

Students joined the club to explore interest in civics.

Moylan's mother is a judge and often helps her with civic engagement in one form or another. After this experience, he would like to be a lawyer and potentially a politician.

Chinn said she was already interested because civics is interwoven in every aspect of life.

"I wouldn't say I necessarily got into civics," Chinn said. "I would just say that it's everywhere around you, and it has to do with your daily life and everything."

She said she'll continue to grow her participation and education in her government and community.

"Well, it's important that you're educated in what's going around, with the government, your local area and nationwide," Chinn said. "So, it's important that you have this knowledge to be able to be a good citizen and interact with it."

Mumford said he would like to be a history teacher and civics goes hand in hand with history.

"I've always liked history," Mumford said. "So, I've always felt that it's kind of important to be knowledgeable on stuff that's going around near you and be able to have some input on stuff that's going around."

Rineberg said his students have a bright future ahead.

"These kids are really, really, really smart," Rineberg said. "Like, smarter than their teacher smart."

Sweet sweet victory

Moylan said they went into the competition thinking they wouldn't win because Rineberg kept humbling them.

"I just didn't want them to count their chickens before they hatch," Rineberg said.

The further into the competition they got, the more they realized they had a real chance of winning.

"We didn't really go into it thinking we were going to win because there's so many teams and it's such a big prize, but we still made an attempt to try and do our best," Moylan said. "So, it was really exciting that our hard work paid off."

The grand prize was $4,000 split among the four students. They collectively decided to save their winning to help pay for college. They also, celebrated with bottomless fries and a victory dinner at Red Robin.

What comes next?

While the team's season is over, they said they are already excited to defend their winning title next year.

Moylan said he hopes more students get involved at his school and across the state. Topeka this year only saw three teams enter — Seaman and two teams from Topeka High.

Team members said they hope students start becoming more active in civics in other ways.

"I'd say it's important to always make sure they're keeping up with current events and what's going around in the world that they're living in," Moylan said. "To get involved in as many school things that are related to civics as they can."

This article originally appeared on Topeka Capital-Journal: Seaman civics team is asking others to do more with Topeka government