School elections: reputations reward

Royce discusses his experience with school elections and reasons behind being elected.

Royce Ingram, Staff reporter

Class officer elections are right around the corner. Underclass officers don’t do much if anything at all in their positions, and they are not elected half the time. Conversely, the officers of the senior and junior classes have a good amount of work cut out. But I’d say it is worth every hour.

I would summarize the preparations of running the political race and holding a class office in a few words: a fun time of high pressure.

Being a class officer is fun, but the steps taken to get there have their share of high pressure. People are competing to convince a class of 450 students that they are the best person for a job. It often comes down to how friendly each person is towards the members of their class as a whole and their involvement with school. The friendliness creates positive experiences with voters; school involvement leads to interaction with constituents that can make your name well known. Most of the elected officers of my junior class had both, if not a solid one of these characteristics in their lives. These factors also happen to tie into other things where people are inclined to choose you as an individual, such as homecoming court. It is a very solid fact that there are people who are smarter, look more handsome, have greater musical talent, act at a higher level, march with greater skill, or simply are more athletically gifted than myself. Yet, by some miracle my name was on the homecoming court ballot receiving substantial votes these past few years. A thorough surprise considering I am nowhere near superior to any other candidate in any of the areas I just listed.

Yet, I think the winning factor for some of the elected, myself included, is kindness.

Kindness creates relationships. Complementing a girl’s outfit, or saying hi in the hallway, is not as glorious as scoring the winning point at a homecoming game, or being a member of a highly decorated band, yet it still makes a difference.

Maybe that specific person needed a high five or encouraging word on that depressed day of all days. Maybe on that glorious sun-shiney day they share a contagious smile and acknowledging glace with me. However useless saying hi seems, it can mean the world when you need it and bring a smile to your face if you don’t.

I recall alumni like Kendall Morris and Andrew Henke, well known popular people. Both of these guys were talented and involved with extracurricular activities relevant to their gifts. Their senior years, I probably had conversations with each of them less than ten times combined. Nevertheless, a friendship developed through those hallway hellos and handshakes with people I barely knew.

Why say hi to a person I don’t know very well most every time I see them?

Why not?

You are showing love, aka kindness aka the stuff friendships are made of, to others with nothing to gain. I personally do it because Jesus Christ showed love to me with nothing to gain, and I’ve accepted the call to follow suit. Regardless of belief, it is a good thing to make it rain kindness up in FHC.

Yes, you will be different. You will also be making a difference and gaining a reputation for doing so.

The return on this investment of love towards people in general being your reputation.

A reputation of genuine kindness leads to favor. The more widespread the kindness, the increased public favor, and greater probability of winning an election compared to someone with a reputation for doing otherwise.
At least that’s my hypothesis as to why I was surprisingly selected for homecoming court sophomore/senior year and Junior Class Secretary.

To those of you wondering what it’s like as a Junior Class officer, it is the fun time without the pressure. You stay after an hour a week, like any other club, to decide aspects of prom and eventually assemble decorations. A few meetings occur at the place of prom, a beautiful conference center elaborately decorated, out of necessity. And then day of prom you set up.

To win a class officer election with friends: decide who’s running for what against whom, make posters, place as many posters in as many places as possible in FHC (following all regulations of course), and hope that your reputation of athleticism or nice hair or student involvement or kindness carries your votes to the highest number.  If you don’t have friends who are willing to run the race for office with you, try branching out to discover other prospective political partners.  This is the fun time with high pressure.

Even if you don’t win, getting your feet wet with involvement always has some positive product.

This is the time of life that comes once. It comes fast. So get involved.

People may not remember or care in 50 years who won what election or game.

But you will have the memories of this fantastic high school to treasure and share.

 

 

And yes, I lied. I said I would be focusing on Student Council aka StudCo in this blog, but I think it would be more beneficial for both of us if I widened the arena of subjects covered to the subject of getting involved in general. So I apologize if my mistake has left you in a lesser emotional state. Have a great week!

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