What School Clubs Have to Offer

KEY Club on one of their most recent trips.

Rylie Rice (9th), Reporter
May 27, 2022

School clubs are not only a place to interact with other students who have similar likings and hobbies, but also a way to build those college application points. Pitman High offers close to 35 clubs, from cultural and political to creative and educational. These clubs present new experiences, scholarships, conventions, trips, competitions, relaxing bonding time, and can be considered a safe place for many. Clubs are hosted mostly during lunch and after school. Engaging in activities such as these, builds a sense of community throughout our campus.

Starting off with our cultural and religion focused clubs Pitman proposes the Assyrian-American Club, Pitman International Student Association (PISA), Hispanic Young Life Council (HYLC), Sikh Honors and Service Society (SHSS), Black Student Union (BSU), and Young Life Club. Joining a club that reflects your personal background or ethnicity is a great way to connect to your roots and find others who may have the same struggles or stories as you. It’s especially important for those in the communities whose first language isn’t English to have a place at school where they can speak their native language. Having a beautiful mixture of races, cultures, and ethnicities around Pitman High, creates a great kind of support if you’re feeling alone.

As the club advisors (Mercado, Rosales, Suarez) for The Hispanic Youth Leadership Council explained, “HYLC’s key purposes are leadership development, career awareness, to serve the community, educate on cultural awareness, engage in social activities, and encourage further education past high school.” The club offers trips to multiple career education conferences, monthly meetings educate on Mexican heritage and discuss how they will devote themselves to helping in their community, and even a camp at High Sierras. Furthermore, they have social events where members get to socialize and bond, some being through bowling nights, dances, fiestas mexicanas, and an end of the year club trip. Lastly, it’s very critical for the advisors to take college visit trips, this year they will be touring CalPoly SLO, entering students in many contests that lead to awards, and lending a helping hand in life changing scholarships.

Personally, I was a part of the Turlock Young Life group a couple months ago, and it was a wonderful way to connect religiously with my community especially as the Bible was taught in a way that younger community members could understand and utilize towards their path through faith. They also had a couple of camps that you could attend including a week-long stay over the summer.

Similarly, there are a couple clubs that focus on politically predominant topics. These clubs include the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA), Young Democrats of America, and The National Organization of Women (NOW). In supporting the opinions and beliefs of the students here at Pitman, they are able to feel like they have a safe place to express themselves freely; especially if their home isn’t as welcoming of a place.

GSA is a student-run organization centered around making a social change in the amount of harassment within different genders, sexualities, and races. It was originally created, as I already said, to be a safe place for LGBTQ+ students and allies to focus on the issues they face on and off campus. For more information about what the LGBTQ+ community faces, check out the most recent article written by Guadalupe Gonzalez. Young Democrats of America represents the youth-led part of the Democratic Party that aims to use the students’ vote in elections. NOW is related to GSA, as it fights for social justice especially by supporting femenist ideas and eliminating gender discrimination.

If you’re in the search of somewhere to show off your creative side or just to have some fun aside from education there are a handful of clubs that offer just that! This includes the Anime Club, Art Club, Chess Club, Game Club, Pitman Poetry Club, Video Club, Creative Cove Club, and the Argent Lion Club (Pitman Rapier Club). Since many of these clubs are pretty straight forward I didn’t interview their members or advisors; however, if any of these hobbies interest you I recommend joining or attending a meeting to figure out what they specifically do, and maybe even invite your friends to join.

In hopes of exhibiting some of the talented art made by Pitman High students, there’s a weekly artist of the week featured in the weekly announcements. Likewise, to promote the inspirational poems written by our very own Poetry Club, we featured the winners poem of the Fall of 2021’s poetry contest in our last printed newspaper, and will fortunately be doing so again this time around. The Argent Lion Clubs advisor, Mr. Reimers expressed that “House Argent Lion Club is currently taking a break. We will come back next year 2022-2023 with the name of Pitman Rapier Club. We are a group that practices the techniques of Medieval Fencing Masters and look into the history of Europe from about 1400-1600. We should be back to practicing after school next year and bringing the sound of clashing metal swords to our neighborhood.”

Another huge focus on our campus is health. Clubs like PHAST, Mental Health Support Club, and HARRT focus on the impacts certain things have on your health, they offer support, try their best to help, and inform students on what is considered unhealthy. PHAST actually stands for Protecting Health And Slamming Tabaco, and HARRT is Healthy And Responsible Relationships Troop. HARRT Club specifically promotes the importance of relationships built on healthy foundations and educates, prevents, and reduces the amount of abuse seen in relationships amongst youth. On the other hand, the members of Blankets of Love make blankets and kind notes to terminally ill patients in hospitals. . Lastly, Relay for Life is a fundraising club throughout schools nationwide run by The American Cancer Society for patients battling cancer.

Last, but not least, are those educational and important looking clubs. As previously stated, many students join clubs so they can boost their experience levels and have more to add on their college applications. Many of the clubs that are offered on our campus do just that! This list includes the following: Science Club, Science Olympiad, Junior State of America (JSA), Key Club, Math Club, Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA), Future Farmers of America (FFA), Leadership (ASB), Drama & Thespian Club, Health Occupations (HOSA), SAVE, and Interact Club.

Science club focuses on the many intricate details and the fun of science, whereas the Science Olympiad Club is for students interested in competing at science conventions with hundreds of other teams. JSA prepares students for their future collaboration in our government’s decisions as well as building fundamental debating skills. Key club is another club that promotes leadership throughout the student body, but through community service. Many of their meetings consist of what community events are coming up and how high school students can make an impact on the society around them. Mr. Matthew, club advisor of Math club said that “This club is for members who have interests in math or philosophy, enjoy riddles, want to make new friends, or need homework help. Math club is very welcoming to any new members! The club is very relaxed and there is not a lot of pressure on its members. It is a student driven club, meaning the direction of the club is entirely driven by its members.” FBLA strives to connect students on the path of being in the business field with leadership skills, competitions, and many scholarship offers.

As a member of FFA, I have come to learn that there are so many other opportunities within the club and classes that the organization offers than just working with animals. From everything between speech and leadership competitions, to floral and veterinary science classes and teams. Through FFA, I have been able to attend multiple speech competitions that have widely improved my ability to speak in front of others. I’m also a part of the Milk and Dairy Products competition team where we distinguish the differences in all dairy commodities. Lastly, I have just begun my journey of raising and showing a lamb for fair. Not only has being a part of this club raised my leadership, speech, and organization skills, I’ve also won awards that will benefit me in the future and have led me to meet so many new people around school. Joining FFA is a great way to have fun through doing something you enjoy, much like many of the other clubs offered at Pitman. Also being a member of the ASB cabinet, I have come to feel a deeper sense of pride and connection with the Pitman High community. In planning school events, spreading awareness about important school details, and helping others engage in their Pitman community, it’s made me feel like we’ve built a Pitman family.

Not only a class, the Drama Club lets students with musical interests and performing talents express themselves through skits, plays, and musicals. Our school has two plays/musicals a year where anyone is able to audition to play a part for the couple-day-long performances after months of practice. There is also an additional senior-only play that takes place at the end of the school year. Such dedication to an extracurricular, especially an artistic one, is a great check mark on college applications. The school plays and musicals also allow students to support their peers as they perform their musical talents and learn to control their voices and better their acting skills. The advisor of SAVE Club, also known as SAVE Promise Club, said that “the purpose os the club is to raise environmental awareness among students and to do activities that benefit the environment.” . Like the Key Club, Interact Club is centered around community service and giving back, as it’s a rotary-sponsored club.

HOSA advisor, Ms. Runyan explained that “HOSA is the Health Occupation Students of America. We are a professional international organization for students interested in careers in health care and medicine. We focus on educating students about various careers, skills and educational experiences and opportunities available in our community. This has been a rebuilding year, after COVID we have not been able to do many of the outreach activities, nor been able to invite professional speakers or educational trips as we have done in the past, but we are working to slowly reintroduce these aspects back into our club experience. This spring, a number of our members will be competing in the Regional Competitive Events program, taking tests on things like Medical Law and Ethics, Behavioral Health, Clinical Nursing, and Biotechnology to name just a few. In late March, another group will be attending the California HOSA State Leadership Conference in Long Beach where students will meet many other like-minded health occupation students, attend learning seminars, and network with professionals in many of the career industries.”

For more information I highly suggest checking out the Pitman High website on our school clubs, or contact the advisors of the clubs you are interested in. There’s such a variety to choose from, and remember you’re never limited to just one. We hope to see you building connections within the Pitman High community and getting those bonus points on your college applications!

Anime Club (Reimers)

ASB – Leadership (White/Jeans/Mackey)

Art Club (Murphy)

Assyrian-American Club (Farhadian)

Black Student Union – BSU (Walls)

Blankets of Love (McCabe)

Chess Club (Hayes)

Creative Cove (Partan)

Drama & Thespian Club (Norris)

Future Business Leaders of America FBLA (Toste)

Future Farmers of America FFA (Clinton/Silva/Kemps/Alvarez)

Game Club (Hatchell/Montgomery)