The beginning of another school year marks the launch of many new and innovative clubs. With this fresh start, many clubs presented new ideas, directly contributing to the overall development of the school. New clubs, including the Lumière Film Club, Finance Club, Fitness Club, World Wildlife Foundation Club (WWF), and the Creativity Club, are hoping that many members will join and contribute to their projects. These new clubs primarily stress more in-school, academic opportunities to participate in fields that are not offered by the school curriculum. By offering greater opportunities for students who are willing to learn more about the topics they are passionate about, these clubs allow students to choose from many varied activities and find their own interests.
“Widening the spectrum of clubs would allow students to freely choose with their own unique interests and help build their identity,” said Michelle Heo (10), executive of the STEM Club and Red Cross Youth. “From these innovative clubs, students would also be surprised at the variety of subjects that could be explored, and could even try out these new clubs for a totally new, refreshing experience. The vivacity of these clubs make them intriguing and create a distinction from the multiple significant clubs that have already been established.”
The Creativity Club and Lumière Film Club provide students with a chance to incorporate a more open-minded range of skills into the content they learn at school, which in turn encourages students to think outside of the box. The Creativity Club creates an interactive relationship between the students, boosts the communication skills of the club members, presents many diverse ideas and topics within the realms of reality, and encourages problem-solving techniques that allows for developed mindsets. The Creativity Club would prepare students for entering the Korean International Youth Olympiad, and also participating in charity work. In such ways, students not only become more aware of the problems in society today, but are able to conceive other students’ opinions from various perspectives. Another intriguing club, the Lumière Film Club, aims to develop skills for filming and composition in students. In other words, members of this club learn to act in films in addition to shooting, editing videos and learning filmmaking techniques necessary for professional filming.
“There are many limitations, like frameworks, that contain students within the boundaries of boxes at school,” said Peter Alden, Creativity Club adviser. “But in the Creativity Club, students are able to think outside of that box. Like the Creativity Club, there should be more clubs that support the development of creative thinking. Otherwise, students will never be able to fully extend other parts of their minds, which requires a degree of abstraction— something entirely different from the formulaic standards we are so often used to.”
The Fitness Club focuses mainly on exercising, as well as maintaining or improving the health of students, by focusing on certain muscles for exercise. There are many different physical activities to shape the bodies of these students and to reach their body goals. The goals they set will soon become reality after the vigorous aerobic and anaerobic exercises geared towards exercising a variety of different muscles to promote a healthier lifestyle at school.
“The Fitness Club provides students with an opportunity to learn new fitness and exercise movement,” said Michael Silber, club advisor of the Fitness Club. “The notion is to give students an organized course of fitness so that students could learn different techniques. The only qualification is a positive attitude, enthusiasm, willingness to learn various exercise techniques, and a reasonably good health. The promise of the club is to give students who are interested in fitness, an opportunity to do this during activity period, in order to be actively engaged. Most clubs at SIS are academic clubs, and this is one of the few will allow students to be active outside of physical education class.”
Last but not least, a new volunteer club was created this year. WWF engages students with a hands-on experience regarding saving endangered animals and promoting the kind-hearted nature of students. With the charity, students will be able to express their concerns about world wide issues. The students will then further establish their interests through nature conservation.
“WWF is a club based on nature conservation and saving endangered animals,” said Evelyn Hur (11), executive of WWF. “As a widely recognized organization, we hope to raise awareness about the environment not only in school but also in the wider community. Our club is a volunteer work-based club, so joining WWF requires determination, cooperative skills, and of course, a love for the environment. We hope for members with a diverse range of skills—from design, speaking and leadership skills to volunteer experience.”
From these clubs, it is apparent that the face of the SIS community is changing rapidly for the new school year. Many are looking forward to what these clubs have in store for us, and how these clubs will continuously and persistently contribute to the school.