To kick off the second half of the school year, the new ASB Executive Staff took office, Jan. 20. The new quad is hoping to strengthen the relationship between ASB and the student body during their term as execs and increase organization and transparency between ASB committee relations. President Alexia Johnson (11), Vice President Clara Lynch (11), Treasurer Lily Cao (10), and Secretary Emma Hall (10) make up the new board and will serve until the end of quarter two, next school year.
Johnson’s duties as president consist primarily of administrative responsibilities, overseeing the student body, and communicating with administration and the school board.
“[The challenge is] mostly just being the head[s] of a class full of leaders,” Johnson said. “It is a pretty challenging role, I’d say, for all of us, because there’re so many outgoing, intelligent people and we are meant to organize and facilitate all of that.”
Johnson and Lynch, prior to campaigning, worked together in hopes of becoming a president-vice president duo. Being longtime best friends, the pair knew they would work well together and planned accordingly to run for positions that would play to their individual strengths.
“Because we’re such close friends, I think it helps us work a lot better together, because it’s not forcing us into this awkward role in which I’m in charge of her or something like that,” Johnson said. “It’s more that we’re trying to work at the same level. I appreciate that a lot, because being that I was the only underclassman on the exec board last year, I saw that there was a lack of communication between us. I’m very appreciative to have an exec board, especially with [Lynch], where we can communicate really openly. Because we’re such good friends, we’ve gone through so much together, and there’s really not anything that I can see that we can’t accomplish together.”
Lynch said, as vice president and overseer of student senate, she is striving to boost student communication during her service term. She said better relations between ASB and the student body will be crucial to achieve this goal.
“I want to have more student involvement,” Lynch said. “That was something that was really big for my campaign, hearing from the side of the school that we don’t see as much, the people who don’t really want to talk—trying to encourage them that we want to hear from them. [I want to try] to renovate the ASB feedback forms out around the school that I don’t think anybody ever uses or has heard of or knows what they’re about. So I feel like having more forums, more ways for people to get involved that doesn’t have to be joining ASB or doing all these things that require them to take time out of their day [is crucial].”
According to Cao, her goal as treasurer is to increase financial transparency among ASB committees to help the program run smoother and be in the know about their monetary standing.
“I’m excited to bring new ideas, especially within ASB to create more organization with the bills and all things financial,” Cao said. “[Some] big challenges that could arise are budgets between committees.”
Cao said that she and Hall formed a special bond since they both joined ASB in their freshman years.
“[Hall] and I have been really good friends since being in ASB our freshman year,” Cao said. “A lot of our friends applied to be in ASB, but they didn’t get in the first year. So I think us being the first out of our friend group to be in ASB, we’ve already created a bond and know how to separate being friends from our actual jobs in ASB. Like Clara and Alexia, we already have such similar ideas and already know what each other are thinking. It’s already easy to work together.”
For Hall, clear organization and coordination are key components of her vision for being secretary.
“I can be a lot more aware of what’s going on in ASB when I’m taking the notes,” she said. “And I think that’s super important, just making sure that the communication between everyone is there and it’s physically documented so that we can go back and look [at it]. I feel like if [we] as an ASB class can be strong and united and organized, then after that happens, we can take the step forward to be able to do better for our school.”
According to Lynch, the team’s chemistry will help them thrive in the upcoming year. Inside and out of ASB, they know their chemistry will lead to success.
“I’m really excited, I feel like this is going to be a really good group,” Lynch said. “We can all talk to each other, and we’ve been in ASB together since the beginning of [Cao and Hall’s] time here. We’ve worked [together] in different environments that weren’t exec, so we know that we can work together. We can coexist together and not feel awkward or forced to work together, and I feel like that’s great because it means we don’t have to put all of our work into just an hour and a half. We can meet outside and be focused on the school and not be uncomfortable.”
For the first time in all of the exec staff’s’ high school careers, ASB will have an all-female executive board—something they are all proud to be a part of.
“I think it’s great that we can have such great representation,” Lynch said. “I have been in [the culture committee] for two years now, and I got to plan the Women’s History Month things. Hearing the women on our women’s panel’s stories about how hard it was for them to come into roles that let them have influence [was impactful]. I think it’s really amazing that we didn’t have any pushback from our school. Nobody said anything about it in a discriminatory way. I think it’s great how accepting it has all been and how much change we can make.”
