As students from Jorge Mas Canosa Middle School packed into the C-SPAN Civics Bus, Edgar Cordero quietly found a seat on the floor.

He remained that way until a C-SPAN representative asked, ``Who here watches C-SPAN?''

Edgar's hand went into the air.

``I never get bored with politics,'' said Edgar, 12, of Kendall, who watches the network regularly. The C-SPAN bus stopped at the school on Thursday to talk to all seventh-grade civics classes about the network.

``We want to give them an understanding of politics and encourage them to get active with issues,'' said Rodee Schneider, a marking representative for C-SPAN.

The bus has toured the country for 16 years by C-SPAN founder and CEO Brian Lamb.

The purpose of the bus is to educate students about the cable network's resources, such as video libraries.

Students were shown a video that explained what C-SPAN does -- bring ``gavel to gavel'' coverage of what happens in branches of the federal government.

``If President Obama came to your school today and spoke for 38 minutes, we'll cover it for 38 minutes,'' said Tamara Robinson, a marketing representative for C-SPAN.

Andrea Valdespino toured the bus and found the information given about the network interesting.

``I never watched [C-SPAN], but I would like to watch and see how it is,'' said Andrea, 12, of Kendall, who makes sure to wake up early in the morning to watch Spanish language news on Univision.

She encouraged her classmates to do the same.

``If you're not aware of what's going on, you may not have all the right information,'' she said.

Aside from explaining what the network offers on television, C-SPAN staffers also gave teachers a presentation on teaching tools, such as interactive maps and news clips, that are on their website.

They encouraged the students to enter a network video contest in which students answer one of two questions: What is America's biggest strength, or what is the countries greatest weakness?

According to Robinson the idea behind the project is to get students to look at issues from both sides.

Wally Gallart, 13, hopes to enter. He thought about the subject while leaving the bus.

``Our greatest strength is our freedoms; we're free to express ourselves. I think our First Amendment is our strength,'' said Wally, who lives in Kendall. ``I think we can fix our weaknesses.''

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