Grace for President by Kelly DiPucchio, illustrated by LeUyen Pham (Hyperion, 2008).

The story begins like so:

One Monday morning in September, Mrs. Barrington rolled out a big poster with all of the presidents’ pictures on it. Grace Campbell could not believe her eyes. 

Where are the GIRLS?

When Grace finds out there has never been a woman president, she decides to run for president herself. No one else in her class is interested in running. Grace thinks she has the election in the bag.

But there’s a hitch. The other class nominates Thomas Cobb as their presidential candidate, as in Thomas Cobb the spelling bee champ, science fair blue ribbon winner, and captain of the soccer team. 

So Grace kicks her campaign into gear. Each kid in their grade gets to be a whole state with all the electoral votes that state gets. 270 electoral votes becomes the winning target. 

Each week, the teachers set aside time for the candidates to meet with their constituents. Polls were taken. Voters were making their choices.

Thomas was sneaky. He figured out early on that the boys held slightly more electoral votes than the girls so while Grace was working her butt off, he was doing his usual things. He thought he had the election in the bag. 

On the day of the election the voting was down to the wire. Only Wyoming, represented by a boy named Sam, was left. Sam’s three electoral votes would choose the winner. And Sam chose the best person for the job… Grace! 

And someday, for all our young girl readers, a woman president will be fact, not fiction. 

(Top image source: Kelly DiPucchio’s website)