Clubs – Page 2 – AHS NEWSPAPER

Competition Warms Up Just in Time for Winter

January 13, 2022

Caitlin Connell

STAFF WRITER

The Andover Robotics Club (ARC) gears up for competition at qualifiers on January 15.

Bouncing back from COVID 19, Andover Robotics has been exceedingly successful coming into this school year. This year, club member Avanthika Suryadevara says Andover Robotics are “stronger than in the past.” After COVID, the club has grown as students have come back to in-person learning. This year, the club has the most members it has ever had, with a current total of 76 students. The club allows students as young as middle schoolers all the way up to seniors in high school to join. The club is a big commitment as it meets every Wednesday and Friday to continuously work on their robots.

Andover Robotics played in their first scrimmage on December 2 at Andover High School, getting their robots ready to start their season. On January 8 and 9, the AHS team will be hosting qualifiers for robotics teams from all over Massachusetts, but AHS themselves will not be participating in qualifiers till the 15. AHS, being fortunate enough to have the space and support of the school to give the surrounding teams a place to compete, will be hosting. AHS’s own teams will finally get to show off their skills shortly after on January 15.

**Club member Steven Zhang and team prepping their robot**

The three robotics teams at AHS consist of two co-ed teams, ARC Thunder and ARC Lightning, and one all-girls team, ARC Hailstorm. This year the club’s biggest competitions include Pioneer Robotics (Shrewsbury), Gearticks (Lincoln), and Brainstormers (Lexington); all teams will be competing against each other in the future.

Although a competition, Suryadevara explained that it is all “friendly competition” and the teams “admire what [the other teams] can do.” Club President Rashika Agarwal said, ”Gracious professionalism is how you are supposed to treat other teams, and even though it is a competition, you’re really there to make progress in STEM.” The goal for this year is to make it to states and then worlds, which one AHS team has done in the past.

In comparison, AHS has more teams than the other schools. Member Sasha Dicovitsky said, “Most schools that have robotics teams have either one or two and we are really lucky that we get to support each other during our meetings. If we have questions we have two other teams we can ask for help.”

The club strives to push each other and continue to challenge themselves in STEM. After coming back from break, they will be diving straight into deeper competition.

Editor’s note: due to a rise in COVID-19 cases both competition days mentioned here have been moved to a later date

Club of the Month

Club of the Month: Asian Culture Club

November 19, 2021

By Philippa Konow

STAFF WRITER

Welcome to a new component of the ANDOVERVIEW newspaper! Club of the Month is a small section that will advertise a different club each month to help and promote the amazing clubs this school has to offer.

Asian Culture Club is run by Vivian Tang and Jacqueline Zhu, and advised by Lin Wu. This club is meant to inspire interest in Asian culture, traditions, and people, as well as their values! Club members can do anything from watching movies from Asian movie studios (Studio Ghibli as an example) to playing traditional games from all around Asia to eating some amazing Asian cuisine.

“My favorite aspect of the club is educating myself and others about the importance of diversity,” said Tang. Creating environments that welcome all different backgrounds is one of the club’s biggest goals. Allowing all ethnicities to come together and learn about each other’s cultures and finding similarities is something this club strives to do every meeting!

Meeting times: Tuesday 3-3:30 p.m. in room 305

If you want your club to be featured as club of the month, you can contact ANDOVERVIEW at andoverview@andoverma.us or through the contact page on our website.

Making Change With the DEI

October 13, 2021

By Naomi Bloom

STAFF WRITER

Oftentimes, minoritized voices have been overlooked, but now with the creation of the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Student Advisory Committee (DEI), things are changing for the better.

Last year, the DEI was founded by seniors Jennie Wang and Eva McKone, with faculty advisors Joanna Ganci and Hannah Tola. The DEI is working to promote and celebrate diversity, as well as to improve aspects of the curriculum in regards to diversity, equity, and inclusion. McKone elaborated that their mission is to instill the values that the DEI stands for throughout the APS community.

Wang said that she and McKone wanted to establish the DEI so that students could have a voice in the school curriculum, what is taught, and the overall school environment. The committee is based around the voices of students, especially those of marginalized students. “This is in order for them to have a voice in a culture where they haven’t always been heard,” Wang noted.

Members of this committee can choose to work to make changes in the curriculum—the Teacher Bridge Committee—or the “culture climate” aspect of the school. Those working to help improve the curriculum will work with the curriculum developers to give their input. For example, if a teacher needs help with explaining a topic, they could ask members from the DEI for advice. An example of this work is in English classes, where these members would be able to advise teachers of their perspectives and what books they think would have good representation of minoritized groups. Ganci said that she wanted to make sure that the stories that are told are not simply tokenist, “just checking off boxes, like ‘we have that kind of character,’” but ones that offer “joyful stories” with proper and authentic representation.

Students working to improve the curriculum could also assist teachers who are unsure about how to approach or teach a topic in an appropriate manner. “It’s good to get insight from people who are actually experiencing those things,” explained Wang, “A lot of teachers have expressed that they do want to know what their students are thinking about, so this is an attempt to kind of bridge that gap.”

Ganci added that she wants the school to be a more inclusive place, where “everyone truly feels welcome” and that “they belong and can thrive.”

As for the students working on the culture climate portion of the DEI, Ganci said that they will be based around working with other clubs to “do better as a school at celebrating identity… We want to celebrate, but coordinating those things can be really challenging.” With the DEI, setting up these celebrations would become much easier, as they would help clubs organize them, or even organize events on their own.

Since the DEI Student Advisory Committee was founded last year, the founders said that students from several other schools had contacted them about it, hoping to start committees of their own. The DEI is planning to eventually try to create this type of structure in many schools in the district. “It’s a relatively big project,” Wang said, “but hopefully in the future, we’ll split off across the district a bit more.” This would allow for a stronger voice for students throughout the district, and possibly even at the state level.

The DEI Student Advisory Committee is open to anybody who is truly passionate about promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion in the school. “We want to have a really diverse group of students to be part of the committee to represent people’s voices,” added Wang. The committee is also planning on meeting during H-Blocks rather than after school so that more students will be able to participate.

“What I love about this is that it is students that will motivate us,” said Ganci. “No matter what adults are in the building and whatever their good intentions are, we have blind spots, and there are things we don’t think about or realize. It’s going to take students constantly reminding us and partnering with us to make it better. That’s what we’re trying to commit to: being better.”

Student Government Announces Fundraiser Policies

March 26, 2021

By Avi Shapira

STAFF WRITER

The Student Government is trying to get clubs to follow the rules and schedule their fundraisers.

Clubs are supposed to seek permission from Student Government before hosting fundraisers, but few do just that. This year, the message is out that fundraisers need approval before clubs can hold them.

“The process is pretty straightforward, clubs just need to fill out a Google Form telling us the date of their fundraiser and… what they plan on doing,” said senior Meera Kumar, president of Student Government.

This system isn’t anything new. Kerry Costello, who has been in charge of Student Government for 10 years, told ANDOVERVIEW the rule was already in the student handbook when she became the advisor.

The reason to have this system is that often fundraisers happen at the exact same time, especially around holidays like Thanksgiving or Christmas when many clubs want to hold fundraisers. “Having so many fundraisers going on at the same time not only hurts the amount raised for each fundraiser but [it] also… tires out the students and their generosity,” said senior Bryan Zeng, the Student Government vice president.

“It’s important to have a middleman,” said Ohad Mamet, sophomore and Student Government member. “We don’t want clubs stepping on each other’s toes.”

This also allows Student Government to oversee fundraising methods. “We… oversee the method of payment and how the fundraiser is going to be run,” Zeng said. For example, many clubs have used applications like Venmo to collect funds which is prohibited by federal law for public institutions. If clubs don’t follow rules like these, the club advisor could get in trouble and that’s where Student Government can help.

Another reason is to oversee the fundraiser’s content and safety. Some activities require checking in with the Athletics Department or the Andover Police Department, and the Student Government can advise clubs on how to get those permissions. If Student Government doesn’t agree with the cause or morals behind the fundraiser they may choose to cancel it, but that has never happened while Costello has been the advisor. Any AHS-related activity, even if done outside of school, could potentially get the school in trouble if run inappropriately.

Everyone interviewed said the system is meant to help clubs rather than hinder them.

“I think [this system] has been helpful because there are so many clubs and there is a lot of information out there on how to collect money a lot of people may not know,” Kumar said. “In that way we are able to help clubs understand how to best go about fundraising.”

Student Government votes on one or two fundraisers every week in their club meetings and consider possible conflicts that could come up from the fundraiser. A member of the club organizing the fundraiser is also invited to speak at the meeting. Usually, they will allow fundraisers to happen unless there is a scheduling conflict, and, if there is, will work with the club to move the fundraiser to a different date.

Some clubs have been frustrated with this system, because it requires them to plan fundraisers and let Student Government know in advance. Zeng said, “I don’t think clubs are really against it, it’s just something that is inconvenient for them.”

This year, in order to make clubs more aware of this system, Student Government posted reminders on Schoology, sent club leaders emails with reminders, and posted announcements on AHS News.

“I think [more clubs have been reaching out this year than in other years]… part of it is definitely due to COVID,” Kumar said. “People are trying to raise more money for different efforts.” He added that fundraisers have “become a much bigger deal” since the pandemic started. Many fundraisers have also been virtual or no-contact.

Any student can attend a general Student Government meeting. You can reach out to Costello at kerry.costello@andoverma.us for the schedule.

Another thing that comes from Student Government having this system in place is they have created a virtual calendar detailing all fundraisers taking place at AHS, and can be used by clubs to determine when is the best time to hold fundraisers and for students who want to donate money.

Here is the link to the fundraiser calendar: https://calendar.google.com/calendar/render?cid=c_ba7ic965jovmdjq2cq4n9osud4@group.calendar.google.com