Americans do not vote directly for the President of the United States. Instead, they vote for electors, who then vote for the president and vice-president. This process is called the Electoral College. The process occurs in three stages, the selection of the presidential electors; the vote of the electors for the President and Vice-President; and the counting of the electoral votes.

Many students enter high school government classes knowing very little about the way the American constitutional system really works. This summer we asked five teachers attending the residential program of the Master of Arts in American History and Government (MAHG) how they convey to students what self-government requires. They said that when they teach through primary documents, students discover that our Constitution is not self-enforcing. Citizens must understand and support it.