The Importance of School Clubs

Clubs are the backbone of Post Oak: they connect the community through shared interests, allow students to take on leadership roles, and give them the opportunity to dive into an interest, whether as a club leader or a member. Post Oak has about one club for every eight students.

Anyone can start a club at any point throughout the year - all you need is a president, one member, and a teacher to sponsor it. Because it’s so easy to start a club, students do it all the time. Although some clubs might fail, the enthusiasm for starting clubs is a testament to community involvement. 

Clubs have always been a part of Post Oak. In fact, some clubs were started right around the inception of the high school. One example is Photo Club, which has an enthusiastic member base of almost one-quarter of the school. The enthusiasm for it, as for other clubs, is real; presidents and members participate not to bolster their resumes, but because they have a genuine interest in the subject. As Jaydn Cleary, who has been the President of Photo Club for the past three years, says, “Photo Club has provided me with many wonderful opportunities to explore myself creatively as well as help others to do the same. It fills me with joy to see our pictures displayed throughout the school.” 

I myself am the president of Book Club at Post Oak, a club I started this year in order to motivate myself to read more, bring my love of reading into the school to create a community of readers, and read books/short stories that do not appear on our class syllabi. I came up with the idea over the summer and pitched it during the club fair, which is an event at the beginning of the school year when students join clubs and founders pitch them. The club started out with 12 members; after some inevitable attrition, we stand at seven members. So far we’ve read John Cheever’s short story “Goodbye My Brother,” W. W. Jacob’s short story “The Monkey's Paw,” and about half of Jon Krakauer’s Into the Wild. By the end of the semester, I hope that we’ve finished Into the Wild and maybe gotten started on another book.

I believe that literature is one of the most important elements of society today. It teaches critical thinking, exposes readers to different world views, showcases other cultures, and fosters imagination and creativity. But reading is also important for social reasons. Book clubs provide an opportunity for individuals of different backgrounds and passions to gather around a shared interest and enjoy each other’s company. While people usually read alone, they also connect with others through books. Reading has the built-in potential for community, since readers often have strong opinions on a work of literature and want to share them with others. The community that Book Club creates is important to me, and it’s one of the primary reasons I created the club. If other book clubs are interested, I would love to join them in reading a novel next semester. You can reach out to The Post Oak School to contact me. 

Clubs of all kinds provide an important sense of community at a school and give students an opportunity to delve into interests of all kinds. I’m glad that Post Oak makes it so easy to create and join clubs. They have added much to the culture of the school and to my experience as a student.