OHS is home to a large variety of clubs that each have their own missions. From mental health awareness to specialty projects, there is never a dull moment for the clubs at OHS. The second semester brings a wave of new challenges and opportunities for these clubs to take advantage of their passions.
With schoolwork and club projects, it can be hard to balance the overwhelming tasks, especially in the second semester when major tests are taking place. However, the clubs on the OHS campus put in the work to provide the best experience for their members and the OHS community. For HOSA, that means participating in competitions to better expand their abilities in their selected field.
“Second semester involves regionals, state, and internationals, if you make it. Regionals is where we compete in healthcare competitions against other schools in our region, and then if you make it, you go into state,” said Allyson McCall, junior and HOSA Public Relations manager.
These competitions can test a wide range of skills and provide the opportunity for members of the club to find what they are best at.
“[There are] group events where our members have to film videos, or write, or prepare presentations and posters,” McCall said.
Other clubs are more specific, with all of the members of the club participating in one activity. Mock Trial uses club meetings to prepare for their only and most important competition.
“We only have one competition in March, and we get one really big court case, and then we break up into teams. We have two teams this year, and every person gets to be a lawyer and a witness for the trial, so we take the entire time preparing for that event,” said Olivia Bowen, senior and Mock Trial president.
Clubs that focus on one major activity a year use the entirety of the year to prepare. To the naked eye, it might look like these events can be completed quickly, but for these clubs, it means working hard throughout the whole year to make sure they can happen.
“We have to make direct and cross-examinations, which are questions for our witnesses that we ask as lawyers, and we also learn about objections, so we can be ready for that when we get there,” Bowen said. “We partner with attorneys, too. We have two lawyers [who] come in, and we work with them so they can look at our documents and make sure we have all the right stuff. Then, there’s also opening and closing statements that we have to write, too.”
For other cubs, the second semester means taking big steps in new directions. OHS’ Culture Connect is planning to host their own culture festival for the first time this year.
“In years in the past, we’ve helped out with Mountain Ridge’s culture festival, but this year we’re hosting it at O’Connor, and we’re going to have a bunch of booths that have foods or games from different cultures. I think we’re going to have some cultural dances and music. People are able to buy a ticket, and then they can walk around, try different foods, activities, and learn about the different cultures,” said Aubrey Baker, junior and Public Relations manager.
Trying new things brings challenges for these clubs, but in order to combat the unknown areas, there is a lot of work that is put in beforehand.
“We’ve reached out to other schools to see if they want to help collaborate with us, as we did with Mountain Ridge in years in the past. We’re also looking into companies or places that would be willing to help bring food, and we’re also starting up poster making during our meetings,” Baker said.
The reason clubs put so much work into their events is not only to help themselves grow, but to provide services to the students of OHS as well.
“We want to help share different cultures with the school and get holidays and cultures recognized that a lot of people might not know about,” Baker said.
Many clubs have personal goals, with many of them going along with reaching out to the community. Bring Change to Mind has the goal of gaining more members, so that they can help as many people as possible.
“Next semester, we’re going to try and maintain more members, try and reach out to more members, and see if we can grow. But as always, we’re going to have our main pillars, like making sure our members are doing well in school and doing well mentally,” said Isaiah Asmare, junior.
Along with overall goals, clubs also have general goals that they work towards all year.
“We aim to make sure people are taking care of themselves, especially with upcoming standardized testing and the ACT, SAT, and AP tests,” Asmare said.
There are many struggles on the path to achieving these goals, especially with gaining people to help achieve these goals.
“Last semester, we had a lot of members in the beginning, but a lot dropped immediately because they thought it was too boring or for other reasons. So, we definitely aim to make sure it’s a lot more fun,” Asmare said.
Despite what some may think, everyone plays an important role in the making of a club. Each member contributes to the important second-semester goals.
“Our biggest challenge is people dropping out of the club, since [there are] only six people on each team, it’s really important that all those people show up to the trial because if just one person isn’t there, you can’t compete,” Bowen said.
