There are a few clubs in our school that many kids aren’t aware of or don’t know the purpose of. I’m going to bring some light to a few of these unfamiliar clubs.
The first club is FBLA, which stands for Future Business Leaders of America. I interviewed the head of FBLA Mr. Lynn to get a basic understanding of what his club is all about, “We get together and usually come up with a product or item that we can sell to other students. Kind of… work on making a business as a club.” They do this through market research and figuring out what people are willing to buy. They work on ways to generate interest in products, like advertisements… which will eventually help them make revenue.
If nothing yet has sparked your interest, there are perks to being a part of this club besides the learning experiences. There is a scholarship available to seniors that are in the club, along with multiple field trips during the year. Lynn says, “Next year we are also looking at the competition side of FBLA which involves developing business plans in order to present them at various conferences across the state.”
Joining FBLA, according to Mr. Lynn, “Helps with teamwork, understanding how business actually works; also developing an experienced type of talking. All of these skills are in demand by modern employers.” If you haven’t seen much activity this year or last year, it was most likely because of COVID; FBLA wasn’t able to do much and they lost some interest along the way.
They have had two sales events this year, and during those events they sold hot chocolate and donuts during finals week. Besides making money there are purposes to these events. The FBLA learned a lesson when they sold these items: they did well on the donuts, but actually lost money on the hot chocolate. Being a part of this club will help you learn some very important skills about business, and if you want to join, the quickest and easiest way to do so is just showing up to the next meeting.
For our next club, I interviewed the advisor of the SADD club, Mr. Fry. He told me, “SADD stands for Students against destructive decisions. SADD kind of evolved out of the 80’s and 90’s DARE program and has evolved into something else. Basically the goal is for students to have a positive community influence and also kind of to give them something active to participate in to keep them out of making bad decisions… So it’s kind of a positive influence club.”
Being in SADD allows you to have a positive influence not only in school, but in your whole community as well. SADD heads many activities to help others in need. They organize two blood drives a year for the Red Cross, and also adopt a family every year during the holidays to donate gifts to the family that they need and to make their holidays a little extra special.
“I think we need to do a better job of educating students on what SADD Club is and what it does. I’d like to see a few more people in it. I think we have a positive impact and I think people don’t always realize where some of those things are coming from, and that it’s actually SADD Club that is doing that,” says Fry.
If you are looking to join this club, just come to a meeting or let Mr. Fry know that you want to be in SADD. SADD meets at lunch every month or every other month, so it isn’t hard to work around at all.
Finally, We’re going to talk about the NHS, which is also headed by Mr. Lynn. “National Honors Society is a club for students who both achieved a very high academic standard as well as met criteria for service, leadership, and community and character building in the school,” said Lynn. There are many benefits for those that are part of this club. He also added, “National Honors Society puts students in cooperation contact… It kind of helps create a reason for students of similar high achieving areas to work in and help service and leadership roles in the school and their community.” Also, it looks great on a resume.
When talking about events held this year Mr. Lynn told me, “This year the NHS participated in a food drive for the less fortunate where we helped raise over, I believe it was 600 canned and dried food items for people in need over the holidays.” NHS members are also involved in individual volunteer activities consistently in the community. The NHS is also planning an easter egg hunt event for the elementary which will happen some time this spring. The idea behind all of this volunteering is to give back to the community and to, as Mr. Lynn puts it, “do something nice for people.”
In order to join NHS you need a 3.75 Grade Point Average, you need to write an essay, and your application will be reviewed by six anonymous members of the faculty, which rotate each year, who will then decide if you’re in or not. Another requirement to take into consideration is that you will need to be a junior or a senior in order to be considered. According to Mr. Lynn, the member count has not really been affected by COVID this year, but they could always use new members.