Fifth-graders were required to learn about the Constitution, and Morey decided to have his class act out how a law would be passed. Students were asked to submit five bills they thought the class should adopt and he then chose the best two. One suggested that the class have "professional Fridays," where students would dress as if they were going to a workplace, and the other required healthy snacks as a way to combat the nation's obesity problem. "The students' enthusiasm surprised him," Berler wrote. 'I thought they would pass one [Professional Fridays] and veto the other, never bringing it to a vote, and we'd move on to the next lesson,' he said. Instead, the students took their legislative duties seriously. After some debate, both bills passed out of committee, then passed out of the full House and Senate, only to have the Senate committee reject the House's Healthy Snack Bill and the House committee do the same with the Senate's Professional Fridays bill. Mr. Morey watched with amazement as Marbella, the self-appointed head of the House committee, suddenly took charge. Applying her persuasive skills as adeptly as President Lyndon Johnson might have, cajoling this committee member, arm-twisting that one, she muscled a rewritten Professional Fridays bill first through the committee and then the full House.... The Healthy snack bill eventually passed, too, with amendments of its own."
