Noble Brigham ‘20
Avani Narula ‘21
At 9:08, they begin to shuffle into the board room. Clad in winter coats or baggy EA sweatshirts against the already chilly mid-November weather. They take their seats at the gigantic table in the comfortable blue leatherette chairs and begin munching on their cafeteria bagels and checking their phones before the meeting starts. This is an Upper School Student Council meeting.
Created as a substitute for EA’s fraternity, Upsilon Omega, when the school moved to Merion in 1921, it has gone through different iterations and at one point in the 1960s and 70s, it had legislative power for Upper School administrative decisions. Today, students have a poor understanding of its mission or meetings, which occur every few weeks.
Natalie Johnston ‘20, President of the council, comes in and takes charge, saying, “We have a lot on our agenda so let’s get started.” Throughout the meeting, Johnston and Reagan Snyder ‘20, President of the Class of 2020, dominate, driving the discussion forward.
Students sit at the head of the table and remain attentive throughout. Everyone who is looking up directs their eyes towards them. Students jump into discussion with the seniors by answering their questions. Student council members often call out their answers or raise their hands. It is a very casual meeting.
Students sit together by grade with all of the juniors and seniors near the front and freshman in the very back. Advisor, Charles Yespelkis, sits on the side with teacher visitor Matt Davis. Davis has an announcement about teacher evaluation surveys and needs student council’s opinions as the voice of the students. They sit on a couch apart from the table. Advisors/Librarians Andrea Yu and Lorie Harding place themselves next to each other at the table. The freshman and sophomores are at the opposite end from Johnston and Snyder and barely speak.
Much of the discussion surrounds activities, which are mainly organized by grade. Initially, they discuss EA/Haverford Day activities and their success. Johnston starts with the questions, “What did you think worked well? What do you think didn’t work well? Have you heard anything from students? Have you heard anything from teachers?” Students share their feedback and discuss on what things should change next year. Johnston jokingly asks “Freshman, did you have fun?”
Johnston checks in with the grades on their upcoming and past events. The Juniors are exuberant about their recent cupcake activity. A freshman mentions a “ski trip” and quickly corrects to “Sky Zone and ice skating.”
Olivia Corrato ‘22 brings up an idea. “We could try to do a christmas lounge decorating because we did that in 8th grade and it was really fun.” Johnston explains that each grade was assigned a season where they are in charge of planning the event during that time.
The main topic is Davis’ request for input for a new system of teacher feedback. Students debate whether or not a replacement for Folio should be anonymous. There is a discussion about the accountability that a non-anonymous survey provides versus the more honest or nasty responses from an anonymous one.
At the end of the meeting, nearly everyone hurries out within a minute of its 9:34 dismissal. A few Juniors, who appear to be the most active grade in the council, linger to discuss the folio conversation. They agree that it should be anonymous.
Leaders of the meeting try to make sure student council is an accurate voice of their respective grades. Johnston and Yespelkis encourage students to get feedback from their grades and share it during the student council meetings. They talk about maybe having some public meetings in the future. Yespelkis explains, “If you hear members of your grade talking about any concerns they have, send it to one of us or share it in the meeting.” During class meetings, members of student council asked their classmates to come to them with any comments or concerns they have about EA.