The NPHS Key Club had a very successful weekend in Hershey at the Hershey Lodge and Convention Center for the Pennsylvania Key Club Convention. “People come together from the whole state of Pennsylvania and all the Key Clubs in Pennsylvania are invited to come,” for this convention explains Key Club advisor Mrs. Linda Law, “and it’s a leadership convention where members learn more about leadership and the roles of Key Club and what you should do and shouldn’t do. [They] also are able to meet other clubs to see what they do, so you can compare. All of our Officers President Jess Roberts, Vice President Brian Cupitt, Secretary Nnenna Nwogwugwu, Treasurer Grace Park, Editor Jamie Sangalang, and webmaster Adam Morrow were awarded with certificates for being Distinguished Officers.”
The Key Club won many awards at convention including…
• 1st Place for total Service hours
• 2nd place for the total number of volunteering hours (6,905 service hours)
• 3rd Place for total money raised for our Youth Serving Youth Project ($3000, this money was donated to The Ronald McDonald House in Philadelphia)
• High Honors award
• DOME Award for adding 82 members to the Key Club organization (they had the highest number of new members for the entire state of Pennsylvania)
• UNICEF patch for our contribution to this organization
In addition to these awards won by the Key Club, Historian Jackie Hanifin was awarded an individual award, the Bob Baggans Unsung hero award named after district administrator Robert Baggens for her great contributions to our club. “The award is for unselfishly giving to Key Club and making a lasting contribution that went unrecognized. Which in my case, I spent many of hours with a fellow member putting a scrapbook together for the competition at PA convention.”
To anyone who is interested in going to convention next year, Jackie explains what happens in convention since she has gone twice.
“The first thing you do when you arrive at the conference is get settled into your room and then go to dinner. Then we have a general session with every convention member where we hear a key note speaker and other general things which happened in the past year. Then we are broken up randomly into breakout leadership groups where we do ice breakers and other fun games and activities that have to do with leadership. Then we have a meet and greet where we meet other members from around Pennsylvania. The next day we listen to the officers that are running for the executive board (positions for the state of PA), and our nominee for international positions for the upcoming year, and then our clubs vote on who we elect. There are workshops we can attend when we have free time. There is an awards assembly, then we go back into our breakout groups and then there is a dance. The last day we get into our breakout groups for the final time, and then there is the closing ceremony where we find out who won for the executive board and our district board. My favorite part is when the lieutenant governors (positions who oversee several schools in a district of PA), try and bribe you to buy their dance tickets. Which at the dance, whoever’s ticket gets called for the LTG, then they slow dance with him/her! It’s really fun to see all the LTG’S try and hustle you for your money to dance with them, and all the money goes to a scholarship for someone who can’t afford to go to convention next year.” And when asked if she would go again Jackie said “I really enjoyed the conference, it was a lot of fun! I met new people, and I hung out with people that I met at last year’s convention. I am definitely going next year, and I would highly recommend going! Even if someone doesn’t hold major officer position, you learn a lot of leadership skills and meet new people. Even after a year, I still talk to some of the people I met last year every day.”
Law was also awarded for being a very dedicated advisor to Key Club. “I was honored at the Saturday Night General session attended by a total of 650 members and advisors, given to me by the Governor and the entire Board of Directors and the Student Board of directors for my 15 years of continued service to the North Penn High School Key Club.”
Additionally, a special thanks goes out to Ms. Ward for her dedication to North Penn’s Key Club and supporting them this past weekend.
Congratulations to the Key Club on a job well done!