By Anneliese Duong
Due to the increased amount of clubs during the 2022-2023 school year, Fountain Valley High School’s (FVHS) Associated Student Body (ASB) will look to condense the number of clubs on campus with overlapping purposes for the next school year.
According to Assistant Principal of Activities and Athletics Hayato Yuuki, the number of clubs typically range between 75 and 90. In the past three years, these numbers have increased. There were 78 clubs in 2020-2021, 81 in 2021-2022 and then the number jumped to 103 at the beginning of this year. That steep increase became a concern for ASB, whose Student Culture commission has to coordinate with each club to make sure they are receiving enough support during school events. Clubs struggled to attract people to their booths at events such as Club Rush, Fall Fest and Culture Fest because of the competition.
According to ASB advisor Patricia Brewer, many staff members’ complaints regarding clubs stemmed from the fact there were too many with similar mission statements.
“There are a lot of clubs that overlap, and that has been a major concern brought to ASB by staff members,” Brewer said. “So instead of having a bunch of different clubs on campus that do the exact same thing, or very similar, we’re looking to introduce more people to each other and work together for the same concept.”
As a student who started up Public Works with his friends, junior Thomas Trinh acknowledged the ASB’s decision to approve less clubs in the future but still felt uneasy about the outcomes.
“I have mixed feelings about ASB’s plan to reduce the number of clubs. On one hand, it can be good because it might make the clubs that are left more active and exciting. With fewer clubs, there could be more support and resources available to make them better,” Trinh said. “But on the other hand, it might not be fair to the students who are already part of clubs that might be merged or eliminated.”
ASB Student Culture will look more closely at club applications to determine a club’s eligibility. They will consider several factors when accepting a club, such as its impact on campus and membership in previous years.
“It depends on the application, but we have records like who submitted meeting minutes, how many people are attending those meetings [and] how long that club has been around,” ASB Vice President Diane Dao said. “There’s no definitive answer, but it definitely depends on how well they put their application together.”
Dao emphasizes that the condensing of clubs is more of a benefit than a disadvantage for FVHS.
“It’s just so we can try to have less clubs on campus and have clubs that are really passionate about the causes [within] the club,” Dao said. “There’s so many service clubs on campus. There’s so many medical clubs on campus… When it comes to events… it’s really hard to compete with so many different clubs. We want to make sure that the clubs on campus are really getting the best shot at fundraising and having as many members as possible.”
Trinh hopes that throughout the club application process, ASB will look at all aspects of a club such as potential.
“I think it’s important to find a balance. They could review the clubs carefully to make sure they’re different enough before deciding to merge or remove them,” Trinh said. “That way, they can keep some variety while still making sure the clubs are strong and active.”
This doesn’t mean that students looking to create a new club should be discouraged from applying. ASB simply wants to streamline the process and provide more opportunities for clubs to have a spotlight on campus.
“It’s not an official ‘we need this number,’ policy [that’s] written in stone,” ASB Co-Parliamentarian David Escutia said. “It’s more of a heads up or F.Y.I. [that] there will probably be less clubs approved in the future.”
With the reduction of clubs on campus, ASB looks forward to seeing more collaboration amongst current clubs with similar goals. This way, the best opportunities will be given to all members passionately involved in their club, rather than a select group of students.
“Instead of [having] five clubs fight each other for the same goal, maybe those clubs can link up and be a stronger one team towards the same goal,” Escutia said.
