Clubs are a fundamental part of the Moorestown Friends School community. Students’ ability to collaborate, relax, or even create their own club to occupy their time during lunch is a core aspect to life in the Upper School. When the discussion of club reform began last May, it was clear this would become an extremely controversial issue among students and faculty at MFS. Many students have become concerned that their club could potentially be eliminated because of standards set by Agenda Committee. The January Meeting for Worship for Business quickly turned argumentative as students and faculty alike saw a glimpse of a new future for clubs that may be seen as bureaucratic. A google form was proposed as a solution to hold club officers responsible to meet regularly with a set agenda. Many believe that the need for club consolidation is a necessity for not only students, but also faculty. Teachers have given up their lunchtime for years as advisors of several Upper School, and sometimes Middle School, clubs that often take up precious prep and meeting time for struggling students. Ms. McFeely addressed the club advisor problem, saying,”If the problem is lack of enough faculty to supervise clubs, then it seems to me the thing to do is limit the number of clubs to the number of available faculty. Then trust both the faculty supervisors and the club members to behave properly.” The majority of Upper School students are involved in two to four clubs each rotation in addition to the mandatory committee attendance for class officers. Although there are a plethora of clubs at MFS, it is hard to record exactly how many clubs are actually meeting regularly.
As suggested by Mr. Omilian, a club selfie is a sufficient way to capture club productivity than formal minutes. Fifty two percent of WordsWorth survey respondents agreed that they preferred taking a selfie than filling out a Google Form after every club meeting. It seems to be a survey consensus that students would rather have random check-ins by Agenda Clerks or faculty. The debate of how to properly account for clubs will continue in Agenda Committee and later in MFWFB this spring, but as for how to draw the entire Upper School toward consensus on the Clerks’ proposed solution, Mariana Goldlust (11th) explained, “A simple form would not take too much time and would truly increase accountability and efficiency across the board. Perhaps the frequency or length of the form is what needs to be compromised in order to get more support.”
On the other hand, students like Sophomore Henry Powell disagree and say that clubs shouldn’t have to complete a form but just take attendance. Powell says that Agenda should “make sure [clubs] are getting attendance, but not [be] so stingy as to have a form after every meeting.” Another online response (submitted without a student name) read: “I think that those in Agenda committee have an idea of which clubs they are concerned with. Therefore, there is no point in trying to have everyone fill out the form, because it’s sort of like punishing everyone for what one person does. If a club isn’t meeting regularly or isn’t fulfilling their duty as a club, they probably aren’t going to fill out the form either. This makes it so that those who already are doing what they should be doing now have an added responsibility at the expense of someone who isn’t going to acknowledge the form anyway.” The controversial club regulation debate will certainly continue until later this year, but for right now it is clear that the process of deciding what makes a true club is going to be arduous.
