Four Metea students started a Psychology Club which meets every other Thursday in the large forum room. The newly established Psychology Club had their first meeting on Feb. 8. The founders worked together to share their unique interests with the student population. Their first meeting had a great turnout, and founder Nghi Nguyen looks forward to a great rest of the year and opens doors to all students.
“It’s going to be an open club for anybody who is even interested in psychology,” Nguyen said. “You don’t have to be in a psychology class or AP psych.”
The founders of the club – Nghi Nguyen, Daniela Tomassini, Stephanie Smith, and Kate Linnert – approached Mike O’Neill, psychology and government teacher, who agreed to be the sponsor of the club. O’Neill described the founders as “passionate and driven”.
“The one student [who] I have [in a class] is a great student,” O’Neill said. “The other students, I asked around, and all the teacher said [that] they’re all really highly motivated kids. It was really kind of a student-directed student initiative.”
Metea Valley is the last in District 204 to have a psychology club. Although attempts have been made previously by students to start a club, they were futile as students were unable to find a sponsor.
“Teachers are really, really busy.” O’Neill said. “I’m more than happy to help and be a support system. But at the end of the day, I didn’t want this to be like another class that I had to teach. I think finding students that were going to be driven to put something together [was important].” .
Everyone involved in establishing psychology club have a great passion for the subject and definitively believe that psychology is an incredibly useful study. Psychology is a study that is useful in many other professions, whether that be medicine, business, or marketing and advertising.
The founders of the club have big plans for the club and have arranged many activities for students to partake in, ranging from experiments to jeopardy nights.
“So if I was to break up [what we are going to do in the club] into three categories it would be activities related to psychology, the guest speakers, and then movie nights and whatnot,” O’Neill said.
Students can expect mini demonstrations and experimentations in the club. These demonstrations and experiments will be similar to those students study in AP Psychology but the founders plan to bring in new experiments to avoid overlap and repetition between AP Psychology and Psychology Club. Students will also have the opportunity to listen to guest speakers such as college professors, therapists, and people with careers in psychology. Finally, the club also plans to host fun activities to promote bonding such as movie night or jeopardy night.
O’Neill hopes the club will be a good stepping stone for underclassmen to consider taking AP Psychology as upperclassmen. He believed that underclassmen will see the value of taking the course through participating in the club.
The founders anticipate the growth of the club and look forward to providing more opportunities for students to immerse themselves in the study of psychology. They see themselves hosting many volunteer opportunities and fundraisers in the future.
“It’s not really a time-consuming club that you need to put all your time into, it’s just more of a relaxed club,” Nguyen says.
