Meet Your Ticket

Students play several rounds of 538-0, choose their most interesting ticket — their best result, their most lopsided defeat, or simply the pairing they found most surprising — and then research and present a profile of that president and vice president. The card is just the hook; a real source is the assignment. The profile can be a short written piece or a brief verbal presentation to the class.

Learning Objectives

• Locate and evaluate factual information about a historical figure from a reliable source.
• Distinguish between the game’s invented stats and a person’s actual historical record.
• Compare outcomes across several games and make a reasoned choice about which ticket to profile.
• Write a clear, organized short biography in their own words.

How to Run It

1. Each student plays several rounds of 538-0 at 538-0.com, keeping a quick tally of each ticket and its result.
2. Students choose one ticket to profile — their best win, their worst blowout, or the pairing they found most surprising — and say in a sentence why they chose it.
3. From that ticket, students pick one of the two figures (president or vice president) to research in depth.
4. Using a classroom-approved source (encyclopedia, textbook, library database), students answer: When did this person live? What are they actually known for? What office or role did they hold, if any? What is one thing that surprised you?
5. Students present the figure as either a 200–300 word written profile or a 60–90 second verbal presentation to the class — the ‘elevator pitch for a running mate’ — ending with the one surprising thing.

Discussion Questions

• How different was the real person from the card in the game?
• Did the game give this person a fair ‘fame’ level? Should more people know about them?
• Would these two people actually have run together? Why or why not?
• Why did you choose the ticket you did — the win, the blowout, or the surprise? What made it worth a closer look?