Due to safety restrictions, extracurricular clubs and organizations have been limited this year. Student council has made adjustments to the club’s application process, meeting style and volunteer activities in order to comply with safety restrictions.

Instead of a canned food drive, student council is working on the Hawk Pantry. The Hawk Pantry will provide students of a lower socioeconomic status with donated materials such as clothing, shoes and snacks.  

“We have to move everything virtual or at least make it socially distanced,” student council vice president junior Paige Zagumny said. “Right now I think we are planning the Hawk Pantry instead of the canned food drive, so we have to change that a little bit. But outside of that, it’s really just social distancing.”

In previous years, student council meetings were held twice a week during block lunch, but with the current absence of block lunch they have found solutions to make the meetings virtual.

“We just recently set up a Canvas; we had our first meeting which was a video we made for people to watch and we sent that out two weeks ago,” Zagumny said. “As of right now, we are sending out videos, but we are trying to plan a WebEx meeting with kids at different times so we can talk to them and get their input on things.”

Student council has seen a decrease this year in members, but they have had an increase in senior members. Previously, seniors who participated in student council for any two years would receive a cord at graduation, but the cord requirements have been adjusted, so that one of those years needs to be their senior year. 

“We changed it to where seniors do have to be involved their last year [in order to receive a cord], so we have a few more seniors than normal,” Zagumny said. “We definitely have had a lot less kids signing up because of not being able to have events to get people involved or to see if they’re interested [in student council]. We are also creating opportunities for [virtual and virtual plus students] to be involved.”

The school has restricted the amount of time students can stay on campus for after school tutorials and activities, making scheduling student events difficult. 

“We are working right now to see if we can have any events for kids in-person, but other than that it’s just us trying to spread spirit with dress up days, homecoming stuff, going to the games (as long as you are able to be safe), keeping your mask on and social distancing,” Zagumny said. “Outside of that, we are trying to do stuff but it’s harder considering we have to make sure everyone is staying safe.”