Campion College stages virtual club expos

The global pandemic has changed the way we do many things, and keeping students engaged in co-curricular activities is as much a challenge as keeping them engaged in online learning. Last year, Campion College staged its first virtual club expo to showcase co-curricular activities, an event where student organisations come together to highlight the various ways that students can get involved in extra curricular activities.

Before the pandemic, club expo was one of the hallmarks of the school year, where over 50 clubs would showcase their activities and reach out to students to become members of the clubs which interest them.

According to Campion College’s co-curricular coordinator, Cheryl Holdsworth-McKenzie, “Many people thought it was impossible to keep students engaged virtually after school, due to Zoom fatigue with being online in classes from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. I must confess that last year when the idea of a club expo crossed my mind, I really did not know how the logistics of the event would work. However, I felt it was important to keep students engaged in co-curricular activities because of the benefits to be derived from these activities, including a way to keep them connected with one another, building character, making students well-rounded ,and providing an outlet to focus on their mental health. With a very tech-savvy group of sixth-form students, we managed to have a very successful club expo via the Zoom platform, which utilises breakout rooms and other features, thus making it easier to host such an event. A virtual lunch hour concert was also included last year, and again this year.

Planning the second virtual club expo was much easier this year because of the experience of last year. The theme, ‘Staying connected through the unexpected’, is geared towards the ingenuity creativity of clubs to use social media to keep their members engaged and encourage other students to become interested.