National studies suggest that student success, such as better grades, better paying jobs and lifestyles, and life experiences, is directly linked to student involvement. This could include involvement in student government, sports, school or local clubs and organizations, and many other extracurricular activities. These organizations are known to provide many benefits, such as learning which hobbies you enjoy, meeting/talking to people you may otherwise not hang out with, develop skills toward leadership and working with others, how to take action when you notice a problem, expand your resume, give back to the community, and how to manage time and priorities. Student involvement has also been shown to lead to higher grades because, ironically, students that are more involved devote more time to academics and are more productive by learning how to budget their time.

For this reason, Ascension Episcopal School, which is a big supporter of the philosophy “set students up for success”, has established many clubs, sports teams and opportunities for students to take part and broaden their experiences in school and student life. The club system at Ascension has become a big part of our school and student life because it not only contributes to school spirit and building friendships within the school, but it also reaches out to people in the community and allows students to take part in something bigger to make a difference.

Despite their significance, clubs seem to have evolved into being “in name only” and just something more to write on a resume, leading to student participation and involvement in clubs ever failing. To address this issue, Connor Landry, a junior at Ascension Episcopal School, founded the club council to help promote club participation by establishing a new system in hopes of improving and making clubs more enjoyable and something students will be enthusiastic to be a part of. This new system required for students to sign up for a maximum of three clubs and attend at least one meeting of each club per month. These meetings will be held during advisory time once per week to allow students to better coordinate their time to more easily attend meetings and enhance student involvement. Landry believes that this system will allow people to be more active because it allows students to contribute their focus to only a few clubs instead of just filling their resume with a list of clubs where they might be overwhelmed and not be able to be active participants. In conclusion, it would be beneficial to follow this vision and enhance the experience of clubs at our school so become involved and help contribute to this change!