The official site of the Torch, the student-run newspaper at Glenbrook North High School.

Torch

The official site of the Torch, the student-run newspaper at Glenbrook North High School.

Torch

The official site of the Torch, the student-run newspaper at Glenbrook North High School.

Torch

Get involved the right way

It was the mantra of nearly every adult in your life even before you got to high school: “Get involved.” And you continue to hear it all the way through high school until you hit senior year, at which point you start to hear pitches from college admissions officers in which they tout their school’s insane number of extracurricular offerings and boast about just how “involved” their student body is. And again you’ve got to start thinking about how you’re going to rise to the challenge of that two-word directive, and in a cyclical sort of way you find yourself back at a familiar square one.

It is good advice, too, the involvement thing. Clubs, sports and activities are some of the best ways to make friends, pursue your interests and build a sense of ownership and pride in your school and your community. You can “find your niche,” as they say, meeting like-minded people with similar passions, which can be especially valuable in the early years of high school when identities are still more or less in flux.

Of course, this is only true if you do it right.

To get involved right, you’ve got to do it for the right reasons. In order to meet people who share your passions, you’ve got to find activities that you’re passionate about. That actually mean something to you. Yes, it is important to demonstrate some level of involvement on college applications, but that should never be the motivating force behind anyone’s membership in a sport, a club, a publication or anything else.

Then, once you find something that you have a genuine interest in, behave accordingly. Around this time of year it’s easy to conveniently forget about commitments and start mailing it in activity-wise—keep in mind that signing your name on a piece of paper doesn’t constitute “involvement” in any real sense. But if you’ve chosen your extracurriculars based on your actual interests, maintaining active participation shouldn’t be too much of an issue. It is when one’s involvement with an activity seems to be purely for the sake of resumé-padding that there is a problem.

This problem is a systemic one that affects nearly every organization in the school, though that’s not to say that most clubs don’t do wonderful things at our school and have core members who sincerely do care. It’s the predominant culture of involvement here, one of “I should” rather than “I want” that needs adjustment.

As we reach the time of year when incoming freshmen will be bombarded with pitches from various organizations around the school, and most of us will continue to hear those all but ubiquitous two-word pleas, try to keep in mind what our school’s various advocates of spirit and involvement are actually entreating you to do. Find something that has real meaning to you, as have the boys of the Junior Board of Northbrook, covered in the news section of this Torch. Find something that is beautiful and exciting, something that fires you up, as have musicians of the Ska-lers or the Jared Hochberg Quintet, to name just two of the groups featured in this issue’s centerspread. Don’t just sign your name on six sheets of paper and then jump ship come October.

Get involved. But do it right.