It can feel like everyone around you has twenty extracurricular activities, and you don’t know where to find one. That was me at the start of the year; now I have too much to do. Getting busy wasn’t as complicated as it seemed; it just took some willingness and perseverance. First, before I start on how to find opportunities, I want to talk about mindset. One thing I have to remember every day is that it’s cool to try. Like A$AP Rocky said during an interview with Noisey, “Since when has it not become cool to try?” I’m sure everyone has their own answer to this question. As I became a pre-teen and then a young teenager, I saw myself and my peers wanting to appear effortless. There is no reason to want to look effortless. Because if you are challenging yourself as you should, then it shouldn’t look easy. You stand out when you try and you teach yourself you can do hard things; if it looks like a challenge, it shows that not everyone can do what you are doing. But you can. Wouldn’t you rather come off as extraordinary than effortless? Effortless literally means a lack of effort or, in blunt terms, laziness. It’s hard to be involved and lazy at the same time.
Fortunately, our school provides many opportunities to get involved, including SHIFT, a sexual health peer education program. Information about SHIFT can be found in the bulliten from Monday, April 14, 2025.
Down the street from Berkeley High School is Berkeley City College (BCC), where you can take classes during the school year or summer. You can use the offered classes to get ahead, for example, by taking a language course in the summer so that you can begin next year at a higher level. You might also find a class you are interested in that offers both college and high school credit. BCC also has a dual enrollment club for connecting with peers, getting engaged in the BCC community, and practicing leadership skills!
Also in the community, we have Youth vs. Apocalypse, a youth-run environmental justice program. Youth vs. Apocalypse hosts protests and awareness events to shed light on climate change and how it disproportionately affects people of color. That’s just one of the many climate programs and clubs in the Bay Area. If you have an interest, look it up and see if there are any ways you can join a related organization in the Bay Area. I’m sure there is!
The easiest way to get involved is to join a club. It can be nerve-wracking to go somewhere new and meet people, but most of the time it works out! If you don’t click with anyone, no one is forcing you to keep going; you can stop and try something else. Don’t be afraid to do it alone! Sometimes you just have to put yourself out there and seek things out. Touching back on persistence. Let’s say you apply somewhere and it doesn’t work out. Why would you stop there? Try again and find a better fit. The reason I get to write this is all thanks to perseverance. I originally applied to be a writer for the Jacket and was rejected. Then in the winter, I applied to be a spring columnist, which was a better fit for my writing style, because I get to share personal stories such as this! The moral of my story is to keep trying, and you will find your place.