Metea Valley’s activity fair occurred on September 16th throughout all lunch periods. Clubs promote themselves and attract new members during the fair. All clubs are given a table where they place posters to summarize their message and goals.
All booths are lined up around the cafeteria based on what color tablecloth they have. The assistant activities director Heather Weisenburger explains the new club presentation setup.
“One of the things that I changed last year was trying to group our clubs based on what I call the Mustang Trails, so they are aligned with career pathways,” Weisenburger said.
The activity fair is a recurring annual event that first happened in 2009, the year Metea was established. Club leaders can sign up for a booth ahead of time and assign people to the booth for various lunch periods. There are 100+ clubs at Metea this year, and over 60 had booths at the fair.
However, some clubs choose not to participate in the activity fair. Some clubs can only take a certain number of kids per year, making the fair something that is not beneficial for them. Other clubs are even more particular about who they will accept.
“Something like Roh Kappa, for example, we can only take juniors and seniors, and they have to have a GPA requirement,” Weisenburger said. “So sometimes it doesn’t make sense to advertise to the entire school.”
Having a wide variety of clubs at school introduces the students to new and different experiences. However, for the clubs themselves, having too many other clubs being advertised dampers the attention given to each.
“Our club is less about advertising and more about if you want us, you’ll find us. We have posters in the halls or ask the teachers involved,” junior Lucy Yuan said.
Clubs use unique tactics to attract students’ attention like providing snacks, lanyards, stickers, candy, and much more. They also showcase previous club activities as a way for kids to get excited about what they might do. Some clubs do this by showing photos of club activities.
“We really like to engage with people and let them know about all the good things that we do in our club because we really think that it makes a big difference in our community,” sophomore Alex Reed said.
This fair helps students explore clubs and teams that can be appealing and beneficial to them for the rest of their high school career. Metea’s diversity of clubs and activities gives everyone a place no matter what their interests are, and it provides students with a sense of community and belonging.
“You meet a really good family and you have really good memories, and on top of that, you have a lot of fun,” sophomore Advaith Chinnapaka said.
