As the end of the school year approaches, each grade prepared to vote for the HSSC members for the following year. There are five vacant seats for each grade. This year, the election for HSSC representatives was held throughout the week: May 20-22.
Each grade took turns on different days, voting for their representatives: rising sophomores on Tuesday, rising juniors on Wednesday, and rising seniors on Thursday. For the rising freshmen, the elections will take place early in the first semester of 2025-’26 school year.
The rising seniors this school year did not have to go through the voting process because there were only five candidates for the five positions available in HSSC. Those five rising seniors were automatically chosen to be a part of the HSSC for the following year.
Through a second round voting among the HSSC members, the executive team for the following year is selected: while the grade representatives are required to return to the grade-wide election, executive members receive an automatic entry.
“I decided to run for HSSC this year because I wanted to represent students’ opinions and make school more fun,” Hannah Park (10), HSSC candidate, said. “Although it is time-consuming, participating as an HSSC member is a memorable and fun experience.”
HSSC seeks to represent the student body, hosting numerous events that enrich SIS students’ school experience. This year, HSSC organized annual events such as the Hori Games and Freshmen Late Night. Furthermore, they take responsibility for running snack shacks for students during office hours. These opportunities are not only limited to activities inside of school, as there are also special opportunities open for HSSC members to participate in leadership trips each year.
While being in HSSC offers many opportunities to its members, there are also responsibilities and sacrifices that members have to take. Students are often required to spend their office hours working at the Snack Shack duty or stay after school to prepare and host school events. The club meetings that are held every Monday continue throughout the whole school year, even after most of the clubs are done with their activities and meetings.
“I was a member of the 2024-‘25 HSSC, and it required quite a bit of commitment,” Jason Kang (10), HSSC candidate, said. “It required much more effort than my other clubs, but was also a very meaningful experience.”
Students who hoped to participate in hosting annual events and representing the school worked to promote themselves among the other candidates. Starting from weeks before the election, students promoted themselves with appealing and creative posters and videos. While the posters and speeches are a required part of the election process, video is an optional method that students can choose to make. As such, some students created additional videos to post via Instagram in order to differentiate themselves.
“By running for HSSC, I wanted to make the school experience more interactive by hosting more events that students could participate in,” Jen Park (9), HSSC candidate, said. “I think the speech would be the most important part of the election as the voting takes place right after the speech.”
The candidates prepare a short speech that they deliver in the auditorium right before the votes are cast. Many students compete to make their speech memorable and interesting so that they would be able to distinguish themselves from many of the candidates.
The following members were elected this year: Leona Gohde, Irene Joh, Allison Kim, Ian Kim, and Ethan Park as sophomore representatives; Jason Kang, YJ Kang, Ryan Lee, Joseph Lim, and Hannah Park as junior representatives; and Jian Hong, Russell Jin, Chloe Kim, Danwoo Kim, and Yoonwoo Lee as senior representatives.
