By Jessica Nguyen, Staff Writer
The sound of children laughing fills her ears and as she catches the ball and dashes away. Hours later as she was sitting in the Thomas House Shelter, Cassie Chawke realized some things: how grateful people are for spending time with them and how much she loved children. From this moment on, her passion in life became clear.
Having joined Honors Commissions last year and often hearing it on the announcements, Chawke turned in her application for Senior of the Month. Now, for the month of November, Cassie Chawke is distinguished as Senior of the Month for her trustworthiness, responsibility and consideration, which she has displayed in the past four years at FVHS.
Her maturity and dependability makes her a great leader. Cassie Chawke was the treasurer but has worked herself up to as co-president of Rotary Club for the past two years. As president, she sets up and plans events and runs the meetings.
“As president, I had to step up and do work,” said Chawke. “It takes a lot of time [being president] because you have to be really good at communicating—you have to communicate with the adviser so she knows what’s going on and you have to communicate with everyone in the club and people that you are going to plan events with. You have to do some research on what events are out there.”
Chawke also has been on the dance team for four years. She dances jazz lyrical, which is her favorite type of dance. While four years is a long time, she never loses her motivation to stay in the team.
“I’ve done it since I was really little and I’ve just fallen in love with dance. I just keep wanting to improve myself; my teammates keep me motivated as well to improve for myself and them so that we can be the best team every year,” said Chawke.
Last year, Chawke got injured in the middle of dance season. While she initially felt bad, she began to understand that it wasn’t her fault and that she couldn’t blame herself.
“I felt like a failure to my team and let them down because they had to redo all their routines,” said Chawke. “But, I’ve learned that I can’t live life with regrets like I couldn’t have changed anything about being injured, but I still have to keep motivated and keep trying to get better and overcome failures.”
Freshmen year, Chawke joined four clubs but never found her really drawn to any of them. After some research and to this day, she found a home in Rotary Interact, California Scholarship Federation and Arts for Hearts. These extracurriculars are known for their volunteer work and helping people is an important thing for Chawke.
These numerous activities take up a lot of time for Chawke, but she manages to stay organized by writing down everything in her planner from homework to practices. She also makes sure to put work before her social life and to focus on one thing at a time.
Sources of motivation for Chawke include her want to succeed and obtain happiness; her role models include her mom, who has inspired Chawke with her job as an elementary teacher, good morals and ability to help the community through volunteer work. FVHS teachers like Lisa Battig and Julie Chaicharee prompt Chawke to stay curious and pursue things that she doesn’t understand.
In several words, she describes herself as mature, trustworthy, responsible and caring; these qualities have helped her through her four years during high school.
“I think because I’ve always been seen as a little bit more mature than other people I have been given incredible opportunities like being captain my sophomore year, getting to be president of a club and establishing a club. I’ve just gotten so many opportunities that I wouldn’t take back for anything,” said Chawke.
From numerous volunteer opportunities and seeing her whole family as teachers, Chawke’s passion in life is children. After high school, she plans to attend Orange Coast College or California State University, Long Beach to become an elementary school teacher.
“I really want to leave an impact on people,” said Chawke.
Everyone knows that Cassie Chawke will do just that.
Fun fact: Chawke is a quarter Chinese!
