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Queen's Park serves up life's lessons for local page by Nathan Howes Special to the Beaver 5 | Friday, January 15, 2016 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insideHALTON.com The Legislative Page Program gives students like Brooke Westwater the opportunity to consider politics as a career. The 13-year-old Grade 8 Maple Grove Public School student recently spent four weeks as a page at Queen's Park in Toronto. Open to all Ontario Grades 7 or 8 students, the program showed Westwater the provincial Parliament and legislative process and allowed her to meet prominent political officials. "I learned so much more during this time as a page than I could sitting in a classroom. It opened my horizon to new things. I never would have learned any of these things when I'm at school because the curriculum doesn't really touch on it," said Westwater. While she didn't have any interest in politics before becoming a page, Westwater admitted, "I was definitely curious about it." "Because I didn't know anything, I couldn't really make the decision on whether I wanted to be in politics or not. But this experience has definitely given me a lot to think about and if I want to get into politics," she said. The Oakville resident wanted to follow in the footsteps of her brother, Noah, who was a page in 2014. The siblings learned of the initiative when their mother, Susan, took them to have lunch with Oakville MPP and Ontario Labour Minister Kevin Flynn a few years ago. "It's really cool to be able to follow in (Noah's) footsteps. He can teach me what he did when he was there. We're definitely very competitive with each other. It's nice to even out the playing inside today's Editorial Artscene Beaver www.insideHALTON.com 6 20 Sports Classified 23 25 Holland Park Garden Home Hardware Real Estate Oakville Learning Centre New Homes Living North Oakville *All flyers not necessarily delivered to all homes For home delivery & customer service call 905-631-6095, 5300 Harvester Rd., Burlington New subscriptions call 905-631-6095 or subscribe online @ www.oakvillebeaver.com Oakville's Brooke Westwater, 13, is pictured during her time as a page at Queen's Park. | submitted photo field a bit and not let him have that step on me," said Westwater. The Maple Grove Public School student's responsibilities included delivering water and messages to MPPs and Queen's Park staff. Westwater said these tasks helped her learn independence and the roles of politicians. "They taught me a lot about responsibility. I learned a lot about independence, especially having to remember all the parts of my uniform and my pass. It was a big responsibility," said Westwater. "We learned the different systems of government, what goes on and the roles of different members, such as the Premier, Speaker of the House, Clerk and the MPPs." The Oakville teen also had to commute to Toronto every day, which was hard for her at first because she wasn't accustomed to it, Westwater said. "After awhile, I got the hang of things and I was able to find my way around. I'm actually starting to like it because it gives me time to read. It's like a little bit of downtime during the day, which is normally very busy," she said. 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