GRACE ELLIS: So, I guess we’ll start with introductions.  I’m running for SC President.

EMILY LYONS: And I’m running for SC Vice President.

We know that we’re the only candidates running this year. But we’re not going to slack off. Instead, we’re going to take this opportunity to share a few ideas with you.

GRACE: First, I’d like to draw your attention to what I would call a humanitarian crisis: the tissues at our school. Let me tell you a story. It’s January, freshman year. I’m sick. You’re sick. Everyone is sick. I’ve had three tests today, and I’m exhausted. I’ve sat in four different classrooms already – not a single one of them had a tissue box. Finally, it’s my study hall. I walk up to the sign out table in the cafeteria. There, on the table, sits a box of tissues – but not the scratchy garbage tissues that the school provides, no. Kleenex. The soft kind that doesn’t make me want to drop out of high school every time I blow my nose. I reach for the tissue. I’m about to grab it when at the last second, the aide snatches it away. She looks directly into my cold, dead eyes and says, “Sorry, hon. These are just for the aides.” And she hands me the scratchy garbage tissues. To me, that’s unacceptable.

EMILY: Next year, we want put soft tissues in every classroom. This may sound like a small goal. But really, it’s about what student council can do to improve your daily life. That’s our job. We want to do what we can to remove some of the common stressors at RHS.

GRACE: One area that I find particularly stressful is online work – Google Classroom or Canvas. These tools offer new services to teachers, but they often pose new problems for students. I’ll give you an example.

You are absent. Your teacher posts an assignment online, but you don’t see it. The next day, you walk into class and your teacher asks, where’s your homework? Like anyone would, you answer what homework? And suddenly, you’re losing points over an assignment you didn’t even know existed.

I’ll say something that should be obvious: teachers should not be allowed to grade you on assignments they never assigned to you. Teachers should be accountable for telling students about assignments in person, not just online. This is something that Board policy needs to take into account.

EMILY: To bring this issue and other issues to the attention of the School Board, we propose starting a committee of students. This committee would look over Board policy, and ask one simple question: how can we make sure that this policy meets the actual, everyday needs of students? Again, this would be a measure of improving our daily lives at school.

GRACE: But there’s more to life at RHS than scratchy tissues and unexpected assignments. So next we’ll talk about what you’ve all been waiting to hear about: pep rallies – or as they are now known “community-bonding events”. At the beginning of this year, Student Council was informed that there would be no more pep rallies. We didn’t accept this. Instead, we conducted surveys of teachers and students, we met with Dr. D countless times, we attended two mandatory, full-day leadership seminars, and finally we redesigned the pep rally.

EMILY: Student council has preserved the old pep rally traditions – honoring seniors, offering a variety of fun activities, watching our hawk mascot run wild – but the pep rally has also changed.The new pep rally is a half-day, it takes place outside, and includes outdoor activities, such as kickball and capture the flag. The old pep rally was great, but we think it has changed for the better.

This year we could only manage one pep rally. But next year we want at least two, three if we can.

GRACE: More than that, we want to introduce other fun events to RHS throughout the year. To raise funds for other student council activities, we want to put together a student versus teacher pickleball tournament. And we want to host more guest speakers – speakers on a variety of topics from student mental health to women’s rights, a topic that is long overdue for some discussion at RHS.

EMILY: We’ll share one final goal with you today: to expand student council itself. We are elected to represent you. But that doesn’t mean we are the only people qualified to contribute. Every single one of you is qualified to participate in student council, to express your opinions, to advocate for what you want to see change. Next year, we want to have one town-hall style meeting every month where all students are welcome to stop by, to make suggestions, and to get updates on student council’s progress. We want to invite you to be a part of student council – to be a part of change at our school.

GRACE: Emily and I have both been involved in student council for the past three years. To me, being a leader in student council is about competence. It’s about putting in the work – seeing what needs to change in our school and putting in the effort to change it. And that’s what we’re going to do. Thank you.

Gallery • 6 Photos

Tom Stark, Secretary of Junior Class