Student Clubs: We've Got 140!

You'll also notice that I'm going to go into full actress mode in about 20 seconds. I get made fun of so badly because Mr Ding, my husband is like just in the other room, so he'll like hear the switch go out and he like laughed at me. So I'll try. Now that I just said, I'm gonna try not to laugh, but you'll see in the participants number in about 5 seconds that that that huge number is just gonna go on up so.

Game time.

Indeed.

Hello everyone and welcome. We are super excited to welcome you all to one of our.

Ah Turkey term. Discover Lawrenceville Information Sessions and so tonight we will be focusing on our student clubs and I've brought here together some of our best student club leaders and some of just our best students in general. And so we will get started here in a little bit. But for now, can everyone just do me a favor and throw into the chat or the question sections that you can hear me?

The worst thing would be is if I was doing a one woman show and I was just talking at myself. OK, great. We've got some people that can hear us wonderful. Oh great, OK good good, good good. This is great. So the next thing that I would love as we wait for more and more people to roll in is if you could throw in the chat where you're coming from so we can kind of get a sense of where in the world we're preaching and we can kind of see who's coming from the furthest.

We've been doing these now.

We've been having a great time with our Discover LVL series and we've been having people from all over join us. So oh great. We're seeing New York City. We've got some Hong Kong. We've got Philadelphia oh New Hampshire live free or die. I'm here for that. OK, cool, we've got lots of New Jersey that's always fabulous. Well, wonderful, OK oh Canada oh hello, well that's good so it's about 8:31.

We're getting a little higher in our participants number, UM, and So what we'll do is, I think we're going to get started, so I'm just going to tell you all the outline for the evening, just so we kind of know what we're doing going forward. And so I'm going to do an introduction of myself. I'm sure some of you are already seeing me on the general info session or any of the other info sessions I've done so far, so I'll do a brief intro.

And then I'm going to just hand it over to our panelists here where they're going to give you a pretty detailed introduction of themselves. Just so as we go forward, you can really lean into knowing these guys and knowing what they are involved with here, so you can really kind of picture yourself and and see like, OK, alright, that's what Kyle does, that's what Rebecca does. Oh, awesome animals into that. And hopefully you can really relate to these fabulous panels we have here. So I I didn't.

Outline of what these panelists are going to talk about. So we'll do intros. Then we'll explain a couple things that are super logistics in terms of how you get to be involved in clubs. Balancing you. Know all that we do here at Lawrenceville academics, athletics clubs talk about when your clubs would meet and will talk about. If you're interested in something that we somehow.

Don't have it or 140 clubs. How you would go about starting that club. And So what we'll do after we answer those few things which seem to be the common themes we will segue into any of the other questions that were submitted during the registration. And then we also can touch up on some of the questions that are put into the chat. So as we're going through tonight, if you come up with questions, please do put them in the chat, but know that we won't probably get to them until the end.

And rest assured I am going to offer this and I haven't even asked the panelists yet. But I am going to offer that at the end you can send me some emails. I'll give out my email address and then if you have specific questions for specific panelists, I will forward those on to the panelists so they can get back to you so.

What we'll do first is I'll introduce myself. Like I said, I miss his Ding. I work in the admissions office. I am the director of Admissions, Communications and I am the associate director of admissions and what that means is I get to plan and organize and run fabulous sessions like this with our fabulous students. I would certainly not be able to do these sessions without our great students here. I also run our social media so shameless plug go follow at LVL admission on Instagram.

And Twitter and I also get to run our tour guide program, which is super fun for me. The tour guides are technically a club. We get some shade all the time because we do get to call ourselves the largest club on campus because we have about 310 kids that sign up to be tour guides. So if you've been on campus already for a tour, or if you've had a virtual interview and a tour guide reached out to you, Congrats. You've already interacted with.

The best club on campus. So in addition to that I also coach field hockey in the fall and I Coach Lacrosse in the spring. Those teams I love because they are a great smattering of kids that tried out for varsity. Didn't work. Kids that just love to play the sport and kids that are learning how to play it for the first time. So I love the JV level. I think it's the place to be.

Also, I live in one of our houses and so hopefully by now you've learned that Lawrenceville is really centered around our house system, and that's how we operate.

Not just residentially, but in the day today. So I feel super lucky that I get to live in the Kirby house. The best house on campus. I'm sure the panelists will have other opinions and I live here with my husband and our 3 1/2 year old and our 1 1/2 year old and our dog that is snoring on the couch over there. So if you hear that it's not a human but a dog named Oreo. So I've been at Lawrenceville for five years and I've been doing this whole.

Independent School Road for about 12 now. So I'm a graduate of a boarding school as well, so I have that student perspective. I did all the clubs as a student and so so I've just had a fabulous experience on that end and I love getting to tell people perspective families about the Barnesville experience so.

That's me, and I'm just going to go down my screen. So Rebecca, that means you were up first and you were going to give us a fabulous introduction so that our all of our attendees tonight can get to know you from start to finish.

Sounds good, so I'm Rebecca chow. I'm in the fifth form and I'm from Newton MA, which is right next to Boston. I am currently in the McPherson House, but I was in the Stevens House which, contrary to what Miss Singh says is the best house on campus. I'm a border so I'm in my room right now so if you hear people yelling down the hall

that's why I entered Lawrenceville. In my freshman year, and I chose Lawrenceville because my sister, who's two years older than me, went Lawrenceville her freshman year. And so I got to hear first hand everything that she loved about Lawrenceville from her house, which was also Stevens, and to her clubs, which, like me, included things like the GSA, the Gender, Sexuality Alliance, and some programming clubs as well. So I got to hear everything wonderful.

Outlines fell from her.

Uhm?

In the afternoons I do karate the in the style of tangsudo. If anybody knows it. I've done karate since I was four, so I was really excited to come here and discover that it was an option here as well. We're pretty casual, wear a lifetime sport, so we meet three times a week rather than the usual six. So the afternoons that I'm free, I participate in weekly community service programs. Most terms. But karate also does get a lot done. Everybody tests for a new belt.

At the end of every term. So from the beginning of my time doing karate here, the beginning of my sophomore year to now, I've gone from white belt to Red belt and this past term we actually got to compete in the tongue pseudo National Championship, which is really cool.

And so, in terms of the clubs that I'm involved in, I want to talk about a few. So the first one is the GSA, the Gender Sexuality Alliance. I'm the President of that one. And what we do is every week we host educational meetings where we do presentation on a different topic, and then we have a discussion with everyone who shows up. Sometimes we do special meetings or special events to showcase other clubs or other partnerships on campus, like one of my other clubs or extracurriculars.

Business Spectrum Magazine, which is canvas, is plus magazine and we were founded last year. We've released for issue three issues since we're working on our fourth now, so sometimes the GSA will host meetings to highlight those issues that we've just released. Last spring we held a really big pride week for all of campus, so we decorated Irwin, which is our dining center and we held campuswide events like readings and.

School by school meeting that was Pride themed we had.

A sneak peak event for Spectrum where we got to read a couple of articles in advance and the biggest thing for us was we got to raise the pride flag for the first time on campus on the morning of the National Day of Silence. So the pride flag got to fly just below the American flag all day on that day, while students across campus participated in the National Day of Silence. So that was really cool. Two other clubs that I do that I'm also Co president of our girls who code which is a branch of the programming club we work.

In association with one another so that we don't take from one another's club basis. And basically we teach basics of coding to girls at Lawrenceville and provide a safe space for them to learn where they are in a space where they see themselves represented in the field and they have a lot of support from their peers. And another thing we started up this year is just this past fall we developed a Community service program through the girls who Code Club where every week we meet on zoom with the Christina Sykes Academy which is a middle school.

Boarding school and we teach those middle schoolgirls the basics of coding as well so that was really fun to see develop and we're hoping to continue that in this spring. The other club that I do is the Technovation club which is a club that guides Lawrenceville girls through the Technovation competition, which is a competition during which you develop a mobile app to address a problem in your community. So we bring them through the entire process of building that whole app and submitting it to the competition.

I'll pass it on to Kyle now.

Hi everyone, I'm Kyle. I'm in the fifth form and I am from San Diego, CA. I'm currently a border and I'm a prefect in the Dickinson House. Contrary to Misty and I believe Dickinson is a better house and also I do have a twin brother who was also in the fifth form and he's currently a prefect and lower where 9th graders or second formers live and also.

I did not enter Lawrenceville as a freshman, which I think some of you guys might be going into. But I actually entered as a third former new sophomore, and I mean, I think I enjoyed, you know, all the experiences that were spoken offer throughout my three years here, and I think I chose Lawrenceville because I think this connects to my extracurricular that I do in the afternoon, but I'm a hockey player. I'm varsity hockey for three years so far.

And that was actually introduced to oneself through hockey, and so that's sort of what sort of entails my extracurriculars in the afternoons. And, and I think, similar to all the panelists that will be here. They're going to share that their clubs are mostly surrounded by their passions, and my passion is human rights and social justice, and sort of activism. And I'm the president of a club that I personally founded, and also a club that comes from a branch of a larger club.

But the first call I'll talk about is G cubed and cubed is a club that sort of raises awareness about immigration and also encourages students to share about immigration and their stories.

Through different mediums and this was inspired by a grant. The walls grant that is also offered by The Lawrenceville School and in this club I started a podcast that shares the stories of immigrant entrepreneurs and my co-founder also used this platform to share the stories of immigrant women through a literary literary anthology. So, I mean, anytime you could always reach out to me to check it out and for my second club, I do.

And this international and the President of Amnesty International I work with actually different schools around the area. The President of India's international Petty is actually the one who sort of runs larger meetings about plans for Amnesty International in the greater New Jersey area.

But at Lawrenceville specifically, I we host a lot of campaigns called the right from writes letter, campaign, and other campaigns related to deportation and supporting those that are DACA recipients. But now I think I'll move at 10 about now.

Right? Hi everyone. My name is Annabelle Uslu and I'm also senior. I'm a day student and I live in Hamilton, NJ which is about 15 to 20 minutes away from Lawrenceville.

And I was in the Stanley House, the best house, said to mention that, but now I'm a prefect and girls lower, which is where all the girl freshman lived. UM and I entered Lawrenceville as a ninth grader, a second former, and I think that the reason I chose Lawrenceville was because during my torrents or revisit day, UM, the people were just very welcoming. You'll go on campus and everyone almost knows each other.

Which is something I really like about Lawrenceville.

I think that was one of the main reasons I chose Lawrenceville, and my afternoon Coke regular is I managed girls Varsity basketball. So that just means I keep the book for them or I'll just go to all the games and it's like diversity requirement basically.

And then for clubs at Lawrence, where I'm involved in a couple, but one of the clubs I founded was beads for bags and that is basically a club where I'm campus will sort of meet and just make a bunch of different bracelets together. Kind of just hang out and take a break from like or breather from school and then the bracelets. We kind of sell them during parents weekend and that's when parents come and visit the school or just throughout different events on campus and the funds basically go to the bag.

Checked in Lawrenceville, Mercer County, New Jersey and the the Bag project basically creates bags for kids transitioning out of foster care into homes and it's like bags of necessities or for little kids. It could be like teddy bears and things like that, so I founded that my sophomore year and then I'm also involved in some of the publications, so I'm an executive of Alapad, which is our yearbook. So I am in charge of student life.

So we'll sort compile pictures throughout the year of different school events. So maybe like House, Olympics or just different competitions or games throughout the year. So that's another club. I'm also the Co. President of the wall, which stands for black women at Lawrenceville. And basically that's a club where sometimes will have speakers come in. Sometimes will just be chatting about just different issues within the black community. Or sometimes it'll just be a relaxed space.

Or we just watch movies or make sure their scrubs and things like that. So that's another one of my clubs that I'm in charge of. And then there's a tour guide so he'll see me walking around campus. We had. We got some nice red jackets too, so you'll see the tour guides in the Red Jackets.

And and then just one more club I'm in is. I am a library Proctor, so that means basically in the library. I kind of help out with all the programming and events for the library. So anytime there's a library event for example, we have Comic Con during the fall. So that's just something I'm in charge of. But yeah.

Fabulous, so obviously you can tell from these three students. Here are students don't do anything. Just kidding. One of the big things that you'll find here is that you know Lawrenceville students really. What set to learn full student apart from from other students is I have always.

Thought that.

Our kids are happy and I think it is really attributed to the fact that they're able to pursue their passions. And I don't mean just the one, two things that they're passionate about, but they're able to combine their passions. So how Rebecca is able to utilize a publication that she's, you know, a part of with another group, and how you know Kyle is able to balance being on a varsity sport, but also fighting for human rights? You know, you see that.

Our students are doing all the things they love. They're not just tracked down this I'm an athlete. I'm an artist type of lanes so so thank you all the three of you for sharing what you do and who you are. I think that'll be really helpful, helpful for everyone to know as we kind of go through the rest of the evening and so one of the one of the questions that I get all the time and I get.

I got here in the registrations tonight is how do you get involved in clubs? How? How does it work like are you just supposed to find the people? And so I think Lawrenceville does it right in that we have something called club night and I love this night I actually go every year even though I can't sign up for any clubs. But I go just to check it out. And so, uh, panelists who would like to take an and provide start to finish. The explanation of what?

Night is.

Uh, my I can go up. So I think club night for me is. I think it's it's an amazing night where all the clubs with their own respective representatives usually go to the Fieldhouse. This large area venue where we all set up tables and we decorate posters and do all sorts of stuff to best represent our club and advocate to the student body. And I think it although everyone rushes.

To get as many people to sign up, you know, I think it's an amazing night where people, just, you know, share their thoughts about you, know their clubs and also just have a fun time too. And I think that in terms of the logistics, I think other panelists can speak best to it. But I think Club night is definitely an opportunity for you to first go and sign up for club that you're interested in. And usually all these clubs get up all again all the people.

All the contact information of all the people that sign up and send email back to them to confirm if they are interested in joining the club, how they can join. I guess the team that sort of runs the club and find opportunities to gain leadership positions within these clubs over the next years and ultimately be part of that club. And I think if anyone could add on it be.

To share their own insights into it too.

And I could add a little bit to that. I think the good part about Club night is the fact that anyone can join.

And we run club night every year, so it's not like if you miss club night. You're like you can't sign up for any clubs. So how it kind of works is like a big circle and everyone kind of just travels to each table and and then you just sign up and then the club leaders will most likely reach out to you and within the next week and some people will miss club night. But what they do is they send forms out afterwards. So even if you're not there at the physical night, you could still sign up for clubs and you could sign out anytime. Sign up anytime.

Throughout the year too, so anyone could kind of join a club and anyone is able to attend whatever meetings they want to. So that's the good thing about club nights. Kind of freedom of choice and everyone signs up for like a lot of things during club night too, so you'll get a bunch of emails from club leaders, which is nice.

The one thing that I'll add to that is that the club night itself actually happens very early in September, and so it is at the start of the year, so you'll be on campus for maybe one or two weeks, and then it's kind of a big event. You know, this past year is a Sunday night and it was like the talk of the town. Everyone was either getting their booth ready or everyone was kind of getting themselves ready to go to club night and meet the club leaders and figure it all out and and I, you know, I, I guess I'll date myself.

A little bit, but the nice thing now is the way that that we do at least the tour guide is, you know, you sign up the night of and we get your email and then that next day I send a, you know, a batch email with a Google form and so that's how I'm able to then track everyone that's coming in. And so if someone then reaches out to me or my head tour guide saying hey I missed club night but I'm really interested in being a tour guide. I then send them that Google form and so people aren't getting lost.

In the in the cracks, you really are able to keep track of the people that are interested in your club 'cause what I will say is.

There is no.

Exclusivity in any of these clubs is like actually quite the opposite. At club night, it's almost like people are trying to like, you know, get people to come to their table, come learn about my my club. They want more members. They want more people because and I think that is a huge, you know, you know, you just really then see how passionate kids are about certain things. So I am. I hope you all saw that I did put in the chat the list to all of our online clubs.

And so there's certainly peruse that so you can get a good idea of of what we have, and so something that Kayla and Annabelle mentioned is that you can sign up for as many as you want. You can sign up for all of them. So one thing that I think it's really worth mentioning is the balance. OK, the balance of.

Signing up for twelve clubs and then how do you make that work? How do you make sure that you're giving what you should be as a club member? How do you make sure that as a club leader, you're making the club work because, UM, Lawrenceville does take our clubs very seriously. So if the club in itself isn't very active, it will essentially be re evaluated at the end of the year. So it's not just you know, the option of like, oh, I'm starting a club and it'll be something that.

You can, you know, talk about, but we really like the action. So Rebecca, why don't we have you start in terms of talking about just how you manage and I guess speak a little bit of that ninth grade year when you were a new ninth grader learning Lawrenceville? Learning boarding school, learning high school and joining all these clubs? What helped you balance and stay engaged and thriving in all aspects of your life here?

So I think Lawrenceville does a really good job of supporting you. Your first term as a freshman and then you know building up their responsibilities that you have as you grow more experienced and develop the tools and the ability is to balance everything throughout your time at Lawrenceville. So during that freshman fall, you have a little bit less of an academic workload because all of your classes except for your math and your language will be pass fail.

So you have the opportunity to have a little bit more time to meet people, but also get involved with everything that you want to try out. So the best piece of advice that I've always given under formers when they ask me about it is sign up for the clubs that you're interested in. Just sign up for the things that you think there might be the tiniest chance that you'd be interested in participating in because you never know what you're going to find there. Like my freshman year, I applied for the Diversity Council and I didn't really know that much. I didn't really know how everything worked.

At Lawrenceville, but somehow I made it my freshman year and ever since I've been involved with it, it's been a really good experience. I've gotten to be involved with a lot of different initiatives on campus and really glad that, you know, I'm sure some of her former, probably my sister, told me just to apply just to try it out and see if I liked it, because that's the way to find new things that you're interested in in terms of balancing it and making sure that you're giving your fullest attention or your best.

Effort to everything you're involved in. I think that starts to build up your sophomore year when you're starting to really participate in the clubs that you're interested in, and maybe casually attending a meeting or two to other ones that are side hobbies of yours but starting to build up your attendance and your participation with the ones that you really love. That's what happened for me and my sophomore year. I realized that GSA was really a community that resonated with me. I really love the people there. I thought it had a lot of potential and that.

Impact that it could have on campus so and major is going every week. Made sure that that was where my attention was going and so I got really involved with that club and now here I am as President of the club. So Lawrenceville definitely your responsibilities ramp up, but as they do your abilities to handle all of that time management, all of those responsibilities will grow as well.

Kyle, do you have anything to add in terms of how you are able to manage a varsity?

Sport and I'm sticking with your clubs.

Uhm, yeah, I can definitely touch up on that. And I'll definitely say for sure that Lawrenceville is very rigorous and it's intensive. But I think that if you have fun with it, it will be a lot more easier. And I think that playing varsity hockey is definitely an extent experience, although it runs throughout the winter season, we have practices every day. It actually also runs back in the fall where we're also training with the open die sessions that they have at the school. But in terms of managing sort of.

The academic workload and also varsity hockey and also the club that I'm in is that I think that the beginning it was very difficult and I think it was really hard for me to just like rush back and forth and make sure I'm doing my best in every single thing. But one thing I realized is basically just developing affective schedule and also just not being too task oriented. It's always important to make sure that you see the bigger picture and in my opinion.

I think that just having developing these relationships with people just outside, so just people that you have in your class, people that you have in your clubs and people that you have in your sport are always willing to help you accommodate for all. I guess the busy workload that you might have in each part of your student life, so I think it's just two things. It's just, you know, find the right. Finding the right people to help you, but also being sure that you are also sort of responsible for your own schedule.

Awesome in about anything.

Yeah, I think one of the things that works for the clubs is at the clubs are run by students and all students have at least something on their schedule. Like you know, sports and classes, so they're kind of running on a similar schedule to you. So for example, for me when I'm trying to find a time to put my club meeting, I would think like, oh, there's sports then. So when is a time where a lot of people will be free? So for the clubs at least there's a good balance of trying to go to club means 'cause.

Places then and times where everyone will have free time at least. So I think that's one thing that works with bouncing clubs with your other schedule. 'cause students are kind of knowing and understanding what you're going through, so I think that's a good part.

Fabulous, that's great. And one thing, let's move next to his. You know how often are these clubs meeting? Is every club meeting once a week? Is every club meeting every other day? Like how do you you're talking about the time management and So what is what? Has it been the what is the experience been for you all in terms of your clubs and how they've been?

Meeting and frequency.

I think that it you as like if you're a leader of a club, you do definitely want to meet. I guess as many times as possible around your own schedule, but you have to realize that there are people in students in your club that also have different interests and are also having their own schedules. So I think that for me personally, I think one time a week and if we usually have like a big event coming up at least two times that week is sort of that right balance because one you just always want to be.

Constantly updating your fellow students in your club, but at the same time you don't want to take that much of their time away because clubs not run by yourself. It's run by a whole team, and so I think that for me personally, about one or twice a week has been to the right so that golden ratio.

Fabulous. OK, well great. So a big question that I tend to get at least once a day is how can I start a club? So for any of you please take a stab at answering that question. I would love. I know we've had this question come up here tonight and we also got a couple of them in the registration so whoever wants to take a stab at this lead and then we can all contribute to the answer.

As well.

I could kind of talk about that for me. Mike. I'm Co. President of beads for bags but also founded it with one of my friends who's in Stanley with me and the idea kind of came about because Stanley has like a bunch of beets just sitting in the common room and there's always like stuff in the common room like weeds and beads and things like that. And we kind of had the idea.

In starting a club with surprisingly really easy.

I just went and said oh I wouldn't make this club and here is my reason why basically and there's a form that you kind of fill out. It's like who's this? What's this club you wanna form? What's the purpose was the mission statement basically? And then all clubs have a faculty advisor, so you'll have a faculty advisor to any. Just find one. So for me it's one of my heads of houses, but it could be anyone. Any faculty that you're kind of close with their teacher.

Head of house and then you can just turn that form in and basically you have your club so making the clubs is not difficult at all. You could make a club about anything, that's why we have 140.

Yeah, because making clubs is pretty easy.

Rebecca or Kyle? Anything to add?

I I know that you know I don't know you guys won't know him, but Mr August is a huge help in our club sort of services at Lawrenceville. He's sort of my go to guy that that I always asked to or see questions and advice from when when when doing club activities and he's actually my club advisor too. But Mr August, you guys ever get to know him. Definitely can help you throughout the club process and I think it's the one that sends emails regarding the club.

Form club interest form and anything related to clubs at Lawrenceville. And so I think to sort of reiterate, Mr. August is so the go to guy when it comes to clubs.

In Al, just say Mr. August is the director of student life, so he is in charge of all things clubs, but then also all things student centered events. Why so? He is planning all of our student activities which I'm Speaking of. Can any of you speak to perhaps a student activity or weekend activity that one of your clubs?

Held do you have anything? Do either of you have anything like that that you can speak to?

Yep.

This pride week count, it's not really a weekend activity, but it's yeah well. It's longer like is in the name. It's a week long, but it's separate from our weekly club meetings. We do it, everything with the GSA, the Gender, Sexuality Alliance. So because the only time that we have in June, which is Pride Month, is during finals week. We try and avoid having pride week during that week. Instead, we have it lined up with the National Day of silence and during that week we organize a lot of different events.

For the entire school, so even if you're not part of the GSA, even if you don't come to our weekly meetings, you will see us celebrating Pride Week all across campus. So last year, like I mentioned earlier, we were able to decorate all of the dining center. So we got these huge.

Strings of different pride flags and we got to hang them up all around the dining center and we got to theme that week school meeting for Pride Week. So we had people write anonymous submissions about their experiences being a queer student at Lawrenceville and had them read at school meeting and we had a sneak peak event for our LGBTQ Plus magazine. Things like that, and so those are really great ways to get the rest of the school community involved with your club, even if that isn't their primary.

Interest, so they're not an active member of your club. Maybe they didn't sign up at the beginning of the year. Being able to organize all school events is a really good way to get your club out there and get people you know coming to your events, or at least knowing that you're there as a resource or as something that they can join later if they find that it sparked some interest for them later and we have a lot of really good support from faculty like we've mentioned before, every club has a faculty advisor, and when we're organizing Pride week, it was a lot of work.

There was a lot to put together, but our faculty advisor, Doctor Jacobs, he's my head of House this year as well. He was amazing and helping us getting get everything together like emailing people, organizing things, getting permission for decorating Erwin or the dining center, or getting permission to raise the pride flag and everything. He was there backing us up and helping us. But even beyond your faculty advisor, there are a lot of adults on campus who will support everything that you're doing.

One of the people who works at the library, Miss Cunningham, reached out to us and asked if we wanted to theme that weeks library newsletter to Pride theme just to support everything that we were doing that week. Which is really sweet of her and it was really nice to see how many adults on campus were supporting everything. We're trying to do.

Fabulous animal archill anything on that?

OK cool, So what we'll do next is unless panelists you guys have anything to add in terms of the the generic questions that pass through any last tidbits.

Uh, my think lastly is that when you do create a club, there's definitely at least one person in my opinion who will.

Probably share the same interest and I guess liking to you and it's always, I think in my opinion the best option to seek that help. And for me like when I started G cubed I didn't even know that anyone would be into immigration. But The funny thing was was that another senior Sarah issue actually was writing about immigration through a scholar program called Meryl Scholars. Sort of a English scholar summer program that Lawrenceville offers and we just instantly connected over that.

And just started our club and I don't think that.

Clubs are best productive when it's done alone, but best done with other people. So I highly recommend you that if you always want to start your own club, seek out those around you who might share the same interests as you.

Awesome, thank you for that Kyle. OK So what I do what I do is I want to lean in a little bit to some of the questions that are getting thrown into the chat tonight and so one of the first ones we have is can you talk about any outdoor clubs that you have? And so before I even can talk about the outdoors club I can just first and foremost talk about the ropes course that we have on campus like a full fledged.

Tall scary for me at least. Ropes course where we have a group of student leaders that will crawl ropes. Course instructors where they are fully trained to facilitate you animal.

Well then I'm going to stop talking about it. You were going to tell everyone about all of this, and First off, you didn't even mention that in your.

I think what I mean.

You forgot OK, so I will just say I'm going to hand this over to Annabel to answer a question about outdoors because she is a ropes course instructor and RCI and take it away, Annabelle.

Yeah, so gross course instructor. Funny thing I did not know. I like to rock climbing. I didn't know Brooks course existed until I came to Lawrenceville and I think I got became a ropes course instructor my sophomore year. But basically ropes prison structure or RCI.

How to shorten it? It's what everyone calls it, but our CIS. We have the ropes course on campus and we do a lot of bonding activities for the houses. So we have things called low ropes and high ropes. So low ropes would be different games. Basically that kind of work at teamwork or strengthening house bonds. So for example we would have Stanley come out on a Sunday and they would just have music and hot chocolate and everyone would just be playing these games.

And then after the low ropes, we had moved to the high ropes. That's like rock climbing on like 40 foot tall structures.

So there's that and then the RCI is. We also hold freshman orientation, so freshmen we kind of the first week or just like before school even starts all the freshmen come out to the ropes course.

And we just do a bunch of just loads of them, so we'll do some activities in their humanities groups, which is basically their history class. So everyone in the same history class is doing the activities together and then for outdoor leadership as a whole with ropes course instructors. There's also outdoor leadership clubs. And then there's also outing clubs too. So I know for outing club, so go on trips so they'll go hiking my friend. My I think is.

One of the presidents of the club, so they kind of go out to different places to go hiking. And there's also outdoor leadership itself, the sport. So I did. Outdoor leadership the sport too and we kind of went rock climbing. We learned how to belay, which is kind of like lifting the people in the air so that they don't fall and you'll learn that. I know they went to a Creek. They went canoeing, so there's like the athletic outdoor leadership. And there's also like the outing club.

And then there's also ropes course instructing which has to do with a lot of that.

Rock climbing and different structures and learning how to belay and like tie knots and things like that. So there's a bunch of outdoor options you could go with, but yeah.

And then I will say the outing club is a little bit often seasonal as well. So we will do hiking trips. Well, do climbing trips and then they also in the winter they'll be occasionally some skiing trips as well. So great. OK, so here's a question. And Kyle, you might be able to answer this simply because you did come in into 10th grade. So we have a question here about how easy is it?

For a student coming in to the 4th form to start a new club.

Uhm, I think it's actually. I mean, if you really meet the right people, it's actually pretty.

It's easy, but it's actually it's an open opportunity for all people from different forms coming in to start their own clubs. I actually know a.

Uh huh.

Friend of mine actually, who's also from San Diego, CA who came in in the fourth form of you guys, might know Ashley Cohen. I think she all she started her own club and I think we even started future Medicine Club together. And you know, with the right people she was connected and I think she would be able to talk to Mr August and start her own club. So I don't think the grade that you come in is sort of a barrier. It's really really really easy to to come in and start your.

Your own passions, through your clubs, and I think it's it's all about just meeting the right people. So yeah, if you're a fourth former coming in, you definitely have the opportunity to do that.

Fabulous thank you, Kyle. Next I, you know I.

I I did this, I was telling our panelists before we started. I did this session last year and I ended up I actually last year. I invited eight students to come on here and it ended up being far too many. Some of the participants didn't get to speak at all simply because of time and space, and the questions that are geared and I knew that I would probably omit a key factor in terms of, you know, a club that is often asked about, and so we do have a question here and I don't know if any of you have been.

Involved in debate, speech and debate or model UN.

Inuit Kyle go ahead tell us what you know.

Yeah, so although you know I've had a stint of of doing debate actually and recently, I haven't been able to do that. 'cause of Hawking it's it's lower, so it gets busy guys. But I was in parliamentary debate and it's it's really fun. The leaders there, on my note very well, they're very passionate about what they do and they do have tournaments. I believe on the weekends and they actually some of my classmates actually who were in debate and they take it more seriously.

Missed class to do it too, so I definitely can attest to it being a commitment, but debate is a is a wonderful opportunity for for you to basically no debate in different formats. You know, I believe there's parliamentary. There's also public forum and and and much more different options, but I think that once again, if you just reach out to the club presidents, they'll definitely put you in the right place and debate. And definitely a lot of opportunities.

Heat 2.

Uhm, so, uh oh, and now the questions are rolling in. I'm loving it. Uhm so another question that I wanted to kind of tie that to is what is your level of commitment to competitive clubs? And so this also you know parallels with another question we got about our competitive math clubs and so I I'll just kind of answer this flatly and perhaps some of our panelists can add to it. So I would say our most.

Robust UM are more robust. Competitive clubs would be our robotics or engineering or rocketry. Our speech and debate or model UN Homme.

Panellists, what am I forgetting?

Math club usually hosts some competitions like the del Val. They have buses to the del Val and they also have same see.

Awesome so and what I'll say is and panelists. Again, correct me if I'm wrong in terms of your level of commitment to these competitive clubs. I personally have found that if you are in the speech and debate club or the model, UN club and and.

In the fall or the winter you're playing a varsity sport. Perhaps that's not the season where you are vying for a spot in the competition. That's when you say you know what. I'm a more active participant in this competitive club in the winter and spring because I've got varsity field hockey this fall. And from my experience working with advisers, it's never a case of you're letting the club down. There's not going to be someone to fill that role. There is always someone eager to.

Hop on in there and get up into that next spot. Rebecca and Kyle, I see you nodding, so I'm curious if you have anything to add to that.

Yeah, I could start. I definitely believe that it's really about timing too, and I think that's the whole reason why I kind of sort of stopped debate for wireless because you grow to learn, become more passionate to a club that you are in and sort of your priorities over the years. Start to lie in a specific club and I think that you know just in my opinion, rather than doing competitive club, I've become more attracted to sort of social justice clubs that do more campaigning fundraisers and more awareness type issues. But there are those.

There are those that are really into competitive clubs and I think that I can actually test with another person. It's kinda interesting. One I mean and the level commitment ranges he does math I'm not getting in this room for about 5 hours, six hours, and that's all he does, like his in this house. Talk about it, but that's because he's really competitive in math and he's you know, active participant in the math club. This AMC all the time. But then there's those like those who just want to try it out. And are there for a couple hours.

We're four weeks or five weeks throughout the term and just joined the club like speech and debate like which I did and sorta see fit my schedule. So I think that's sort of the range of commitment.

To get anything to add there.

I was more nodding along to the fact that there will always be passionate students willing to, you know, fill up those clubs faces and participate in your club meetings. I have not been apart of many of the competitive clubs on campus though. One competition club that I do is the technovation competition club, but that one. I organize the team so I'm not, you know, part of one of the teams most years, but yeah.

There were, there will always be students willing to participate very passionately. Dunce, who always want to be part of this these clubs.

Fabulous thank you and the one thing that I would like to differentiate is the difference between an extracurricular and a Co curricular, and so at Lawrenceville, your Co curricular is what you're doing in the afternoon, and so I guess we should have started off started off with this guys explaining what the day looks like and how your clubs fit into your day. But the way day at Lawrenceville is it's.

You know?

8:30 in the morning till about 3:30 in the afternoon. That's when you're doing school. You know 'cause at the bottom of all this we are school. So that's when you're going to classes. That's when you're having lunch. And that's when you're you might have a free period and you run over to, you know, Ginger Peach, the bakery across the street to get a percent? Or something? That's when you're doing that school stuff.

3:30 to about 5:30. That's when you would have your Co curricular and the Co curricular is in a traditional sense. Are you participating in some sort of?

Athletic in Denver and so, but Lawrenceville is able to really expand all that we offer and so our students are able to do not just what you think of traditionally as an interscholastic sport, but lifetime sports. You're able to manage a team, you're able to participate in the stage crew, you're able to go and do. Farming as a sport because we have a farm here on campus. And so the difference is that is something that is structured.

From 3:30 to 5:30 every day that is your Co curricular. So everyone is doing something in the afternoon. Then from about 5:30 to 8:00 o'clock, that's what I call you time and that's the time that you are filling with all of our clubs. You're also, you know, checking in a little early to work on a history paper, you're also going across the street to come to to go to a birthday dinner for one of your friends. You're also.

You know doing you know, going out to dinner with your parents, 'cause they're in town. One of those things and then we have study hall in the evening so panelists can you add anything to that.

Uhm, I think I think you kind of covered it all, but I think it's just like, as you mentioned, it's really about finding the time between those spaces to to do your extracurriculars. Because you know sometimes your code curriculars aren't always at the same time everyday, but for me hockey isn't at the same time everyday. So you definitely flexible with your schedule and finding the time before practice or after practice to do this extra curriculars 'cause you're definitely gonna be studying at night too.

It's it's. It's a rigorous school, but being flexible I think is that is that way of going.

Fabulous animal, anything.

Uhm, I guess she says a day student. You might be wondering, like when am I gonna have the time to do all this? But I think what happens is most day students will stay like if you have sports until dinner so you can kind of choose whatever time you leave and come off campus so I could drive now. So I kind of just leave whenever I need to come. But basically I think what happens with a lot of day students is they end up staying so you're not going to be missing out on the clubs or just this extracurriculars so.

Come as a day soon you won't miss out. Don't worry, so yeah.

Uhm fabulous yes. So that that time old question of like what's the difference between a day student and a border? And I always like to say your head of house, UM?

You know you're really doing a good job as a day student. Your head of house can't remember if you are at a student or a border. So the big difference is really just that our border sleep here and we expect we hope we prepare that are day students are going to be here. They're going to be on campus. They're going to be in the house and at the club meetings and in the library and so.

That big differentiator is is just that, UM, so another question that's coming out of our Co curricular extracurricular explanation is yes. Co curriculars are required. Everyone is doing something in the afternoon and then extracurriculars. These clubs are all up to each individual student you are. You are signing up for the things that you are passionate about.

One thing that I will try to debunk right now is I continue here and through in the registration to get questions about like what's the ideal number of clubs you're I should sign up for?

That is entirely up to you. It's going to be entirely up to what you are able to balance and what you are able to to stick with as you're navigating. You know life at Lawrenceville, so you know, I think the one thing that people really realize really, really fast every little wrench in their journey at Lawrenceville is going to be their own. It's going to be completely different. It's going to be filled with, you, know, varsity sports or lifetime sports.

Or farming and then model UN rocketry.

Come learn to skate. You know dumplings for dreams, whatever it might be. But no kid, no student is going to be doing the exact same thing. UM, and like Kyle mentioned, there is that big.

Concern of how am I doing all these things I'm passionate about and maintaining a good academic standing and that is, I will say that's where the good old faculty advisor comes into play. So if you have come back from club night and you are so excited and you're telling everyone the 14 clubs that you signed up for, UM, your advisor is going to hear about that. And then your advisor is going to be the person that steps in and says, OK, let's talk about this. 'cause you've just signed up for 14 clubs. You're also taking.

Six classes how are we going to balance this? And so those adults in your life, your advisor, your heads of house, your prefects? Truthfully, the student leaders that are living in your house? Those are the people that are going to help guide you in figuring out how to balance all of that stuff that you're doing.

Paneles anything to add on that?

I would say on balance it sounds like a lot and it is a lot, but it is something that you learn how to do and by your senior year or as you get further into your Lawrenceville career when you're really looking that you're really participating and the things that you're passionate about and that you love. And for me by senior year, I get to choose all my academic courses, all the things that I'm doing at this point are things that I really love to do.

All the courses that I'm taking this year are courses that I chose myself. All the clubs that I'm participating in, our clubs that I'm leading, clubs that I've been a part of since my freshman or sophomore year and that I really love. And so even though it's a lot of things that I'm doing in a day, they're all things that don't feel like work to do because I want to be doing them.

So even though some of my classes are difficult like this term starting multivariable calculus, I think it's cool, so doing that homework is not a slog for me and going to GSA meetings, it's just a fun time with people that I love and the community that I've built over the years that I'm really proud to be a part of. So it does sound like a lot, but once you're here, once you're in it, you do love it as you're doing it.

Fabulous, well well, great and so that is just about time. So Rebecca Annabelle Kyle any last parting words.

OK, let's let me rephrase that question as three fifth formers who are in the thick of college applications.

Any wise advice for our perspective students that are applying to high school in terms of what you know now that you wish you knew then.

I think for sure is that like when I started this college application process, it's more about self reflection and you start to realize that you wish you capitalize on the things that you were most passionate about, because it's really you're sharing a story about your life. Basically, in in an essay. I think it's like Max 650 words and you really want to summarize that and you want to create an identity based on what you truly love. So I think I have this sticker on like my computer like.

Just look at every day, so do what makes you happy honestly, because.

Uhm, that's going to help you, right? Definitely for sure in your college application too. But at the same time you're going to have fun at Lawrenceville and feel the most productive. So do what makes you happy.

Along kind of a similar thread, don't feel like you should be constrained to what you think you like and what you think you're interested in now. Like. Feel free to branch out and explore, especially during your freshman or sophomore year. But really, whenever, because.

What you think that you're interested in or comfortable doing your freshman year might change throughout the years like I came out at the end of my freshman year, and now the queer community is the biggest part of my life, and I see people from the GSA work with spectrum almost every day, and it's a huge part of my life that I love and I never would have found it if I had, you know, taken the time to explore a little my freshman year. So definitely explore things that might be a little new to you as well.

Yeah, that's kind of somewhere, but I think just try like Club Night 140 club. Just try anything. I mean if you don't try, you probably won't know what you're going to be missing out on. So like for me trying rock climbing, lignum RC I did not know it like that. So it's just like at Lawrence. Well, there's a bunch of things you'll hear about. So maybe go to a meeting or two and you don't have to stick with it if you don't like it. But I think just trying something will be the best bet for you especially.

Writing the college apps now it's just like this is what I'm passionate about and now I'm going to write in like 250 words. So like make sure what you're doing. You're passionate about, but yeah.

Awesome, well thank you guys. A couple housekeeping items before we close out here so I did in the chat I put my email address so if you have interest in learning about connecting with a student club leader or a faculty club leader, send me an email. I won't be able to see what has already been put into the chat, so if you would like.

Just send me that email if you have any specific follow up questions for Rebecca and about or Kyle. Please feel free to send me an email as well.

A couple other housekeeping things. It is December 1st. That means we are officially a month and a half away from our January 15th deadline and so that is the magical day for both our admissions applications and our scholarship aid application. So please make sure to get those in. And if you are still waiting to get your interview done, we will be releasing our January interview schedule soon. So be on the lookout for a communication from our office about that, but.

Other than that, thank you all for joining us tonight and a huge thank you to Rebecca, Annabelle and Kyle for really truly just crushing it and.

Being able to answer all of them. I'm not going to credit myself for picking the best three panelists ever, but thank you. 3 Laurentians for being so exemplary in all that you do. So from the Kirby house in Lawrenceville, NJ. Goodnight, good morning. Have a great day to everyone and hopefully we'll see you on one of our future events. We have some on Sunday, next Wednesday and the following Sunday, so six more that you all can enjoy.

Join so thank you so much and have a great night everyone.