On Friday, Oct. 1 at 9:00 a.m., students in the Kingswood Oxford Upper School gathered on the senior green for the annual club fair.
Traditionally, the club fair takes place in the dining hall; however, this year, due to COVID-19 health and safety protocols, the fair was moved outside. Folding tables were set up around a section of the green and after the first period of the day, each club set up their club’s booth at a table of their choosing.
Most clubs set up their tables with large poster boards explaining their club and offered candy or treats to students interested in signing up. Other clubs took a different approach, with some having interactive booths with games of chess or even an actual fish tank at their table.
Junior Chayse Shamleffer is the organizer of the Activism Club, a club that discusses social justice issues and organizes fundraisers to raise awareness for issues going on in our world today. At her table, Chayse had a poster describing her club, and she also handed candy out to attract students. “It was nice to be able to see new people and people who hadn’t heard about [the Activism Club], and tell them about it,” Chayse said in reference to the advantages of having the club fair. When the fair was over, the Activism Club had an impressive 32 sign ups in total.
Not only was the club fair beneficial to the leaders of the various clubs on campus, but it was also an advantageous experience for the students looking to become involved in the KO community, especially the freshmen who are new to the KO Upper School. Freshman Alex Segal used the club fair as an opportunity to pursue her interests by signing up for multiple clubs including Volleyball Club, Aviation Club, and Car Club. “It was nice to see what you can get involved in and to see that other people have the same interest as you,” Alex said.
Junior Garret Kelly also signed up for numerous clubs at the fair including Chess Club, Fishing Club, KOMAC, Forensic Union, and Ping Pong Club. As a member of clubs in the past, Garret encourages new and returning students to take advantage of the opportunities at KO and sign up for clubs. “Clubs are a great thing, so make sure you are a part of them,” he said. Overall, some of the most popular clubs included volleyball club and dance club, each club having tons of students flocking their tables.
Although the club fair was an overall success, students wished that the tables had been more spread out across the senior green. “I think people had a lot of clubs they wanted to go to and it was just kind of a huge crowd and it was hard to tell what each club was,” Chayse said.
Despite this, however, the club fair was a great success and beneficial for all students involved. And finally, clubs have begun their exciting work on campus through holding meetings and even beginning to hold school events.
