Club highlights

Northview clubs continue to progress and achieve great things, despite the atypical situation

Sameeksha Agarwal, Staff Writer & Ria Dubey, Staff Writer 

Quarantine began over a year ago and since then, many things have had to change. The inability to meet in person or go to tournaments has impacted clubs and organizations, but despite this, they have adapted and even excelled under these circumstances.

Theater, in particular, has adjusted greatly in these times. Being unable to host performances or even rehearsals as usual, they turned to virtual meetings and Wax Museums to showcase their talents.

“A lot of us found outlets for theater within like ThesCon, which is something that was more thespian oriented,” Grace Chawla, a sophomore at Northview High School and drama student, said. “So a lot of people did like competitions for that, or like I did Allstate theater so, those things were still there.”

Another change for the actors was to figure out how to adapt to virtual acting instead of playing off of each other’s reactions. While not ideal, they began to learn how to record and have eventually come to view it as another challenge to conquer.

“We definitely figured out really cool ways to go about doing theater in a virtual setting,” Chawla said.

Beta, another club at Northview, has had to adjust greatly to these circumstances as well. Throughout this process, however, it has grown, and many members have had some spectacular achievements. Paul Philip, a current junior at Northview and the Vice President of Beta, was recently elected as the president of GA State Beta.  

“Ever since I saw Arish Virani, a former Northview Beta President, win State Beta Vice President, I knew that I wanted to run for a position myself,” Philip said. “I’m incredibly happy that I was able to have a goal like this and be able to achieve it.” 

It certainly took some effort and caliber to earn this position; Philip had to go through a long process, including heavily promoting his campaign and performing a speech and a skit. As the president of State Beta, Philip’s main responsibilities will incorporate organizing and assisting with the 2022 Georgia Beta Convention. 

“I’ll have the opportunity to contribute some ideas for state-wide volunteer opportunities and initiatives to increase membership,” Philip said. 

Apart from Philip, many other Beta members have had notable accomplishments, including qualifying for National Beta Convention, and later placing in the Top Three at the convention for a plethora of categories, from math to even onsite photography. 

Juniors Naeem Himani, Ali Addis, Paul Philip, and Bedansh Pandey celebrate winning first place in Marketing & Communications at the Beta State Convention.

Photo courtesy of Paul Philip

Other than Beta, the Technology Student Association (TSA) has also been very active this year and despite the unconventional circumstances, has participated in an abundance of events, including Technology Day, Fall Leadership, State Leadership, and many others. TSA was able to excel at some of these events and win many awards, one such being the Excellence Award.

“There are three events that take place for VEX Robotics at State Leadership: skill, design, and competition. We won the Excellence Award, which is the biggest award, and that goes to the best team when looking across all three events,” Paul Platt, TSA’s advisor at Northview, said. “This qualified us for VEX Worlds Championship.” 

Although TSA was under unconventional circumstances, this didn’t stop them from growing and progressing. The team also had the opportunity to avoid travel costs for events, and instead use that money to improve TSA’s materials and further their opportunities. Despite the challenges, it was a very good year for TSA.

“We have been very aggressive with recruiting. We’ve also been very aggressive at getting people involved and being able to participate. I also was able to tie TSA-related projects with curriculum for my engineering classes,” Platt said. 

Because of their progress and hard work, TSA membership grew by 160% over the course of a year and earned the White Star Chapter Award this year for this feat, which goes to the most-progressed team in the state of Georgia. 

“Earning all these awards has really helped the future of Northview's Engineering program and TSA,” Maaher Gandhi, the co-president of TSA, said. “We've created a legacy that will hopefully continue and be built upon, and I think the future looks bright for TSA.”

Kei Nagahashi, Maaher Gandhi, Jeffrey Chen, and Vishnu Reddy pose with their robot.

Photo courtesy of Maaher Gandhi

Speech and Debate is another activity that has achieved new heights during quarantine. They attended more tournaments than ever before and won awards in numerous competitions including the Tournament of Champions, which is one of the most prestigious national debate tournaments with the best schools from all around the country.

Of course, there is a great amount of work put into winning these awards and the club meets twice a week in order to keep up its efforts.

“The mood everybody's in during the meetings is really nice because we're all working really hard, but we also know when everyone's kind of burnt out and it's time for us to like, just have a group meeting where we all relax and help each other,” Shivkumar said.

They have, however, faced their fair share of issues as well, including being unable to communicate with their partners or even connecting to their tournaments.

“It's difficult, especially when it's a partner event,” Aparna Shivkumar, a sophomore who competes in the speech division, said. “So, you have to make sure that you're working together with your partner, your cameras are synced up.”

At the end of the day, in spite of the unusual circumstances, many Northview clubs have been able to overcome these obstacles and still make their mark, emphasizing the resilience and unity Northview clubs have.