Maine Municipal Association
                                & the Maine Council for the Social Studies

School & Local Government Project

This joint project of the Maine Council for the Social Studies and the Maine Municipal Association is being developed to provide teachers and students with lessons and primary resource materials in their study of local government in Maine as outlined in the Social Studies section of the Maine Learning Results. Its ultimate goal is to facilitate the development of an informed and positively engaged citizenry.

The project is unique in a number of ways:

• The project will rely primarily on the Internet. This will allow:

  • widespread dissemination of the materials,

  • continual development and revision of the materials by the MCSS and the MMA, and

  • timeliness.

• Teachers individually and in teams will develop and test the lessons; authorship will be acknowledged.

• Primary resource material, such as tax data and articles and legal notes from the Maine Townsman, will be made available to the public. Links to other relevant sources will also be established.

• The project will focus on actively engaging students in local government, directly or indirectly, by giving them experience with the process of local government.

• A textbook - the only one ever written - on local government in Maine will be updated for the project and made available at the project site.

Following a meeting in June 1998, teachers participating in the project will begin developing lesson plans based on the four functions of local government, located on the navigation bar at the top of each page, using, among others, resources made available from the MMA.