By Charlotte Wilson & Aarian Bhakoo | June 2nd, 2022
For the second entry in our Grade Rep Interview series, we turned to Grade 11 and spoke with Grant Ren, The Woodlands School’s elected Grade 11 Student Representative. The Grade 11 Student Representative is an elected role within The Woodlands School’s Student Activity Council (SAC). Each year, students of all grades vote in an election with a shortlisted pool of student candidates to determine who will be their Grade Representative for the school year, with each grade voting for their own representative (i.e., Grade 11 students only voting for the Grade 11 Representative). The goal of the prospective candidate is to establish trust and promise within the student body in two specific areas. Firstly, in their ability to receive and understand the opinions, concerns, and specific challenges of their grade to the SAC, and secondly, in their ability to fulfill the key responsibilities of a SAC Grade Representative; student surveying, event planning and proposal, and the fostering of communication between the student body and the SAC. This year, the Grade 11 Representative selected by the student majority was Grant Ren, and it remains a thrilling revelation for him even months after the vote’s conclusion.
As someone who has attended The Woodlands since Grade Nine, Grant has spent ample time taking in the culture and atmosphere of our school, participating in a multitude of events and opportunities provided to the many diverse groups of students roaming our halls. At first, it was the mere encouragement of friends and peers that pushed him to apply for a Grade Representative position. However, as the campaign season progressed, his motives became more personal. “At the start, it was kind of a thing that my friends wanted me to do,” Grant explained, narrating the birth of the campaign process to us in an exclusive sit-down. “After that, I was like “I should run”, because…I think I can represent my grade correctly and accurately, and bring what they want to SAC.” He finds that various learning opportunities in his life as a volunteer and employee had left him well-prepared to take on a role in school leadership, equipping him with the sociability and collaborative mindset necessary to work with both the SAC and the Grade 11 student populace alike. In his unique seat at The Woodlands’ table, Grant feels that he possesses an excellent ability to synthesize, performing the process of bringing ideas and problems to others to collect and communicate across various parties. It’s a quality that allows him to gather ideas from various groups, each with different perspectives, and formulate one solution that caters to all demographics. Above all, diversity is prized, along with true representation of the entire Grade 11 student identity and opinion.
Of course, personal belief can only go so far in the race for Grade Representative. After formulating his identity as a Grade Representative, the next step was to launch his official campaign for election. “When they released the results of who was running, I was…ecstatic, happy to see [my] name on there. But then, campaigning was…” Grant explains, pausing to find the right words to elaborate on his experience. “It was fun, but also very chaotic.”
A particularly bright spot of his campaign experience was his promotional election video, a short film in which he declared his candidacy for the Grade 11 Rep role and marketed himself as the ideal individual for the job. “My friends and I were helping me film,” Grant says, clearly proud of the fruits of his campaigning labor. “We had to go to a lot of different places to film, and it was kind of tiring…but it was a very fun experience.” In the end, it was well worth the work. Beyond its success in helping him achieve a winning share of the student vote, it was a wonderful opportunity for the newly-minted representative. Being able to work with good friends on creatively establishing his electoral brand, as well as collaborating with student artists within the school community, helped him achieve his artistic vision in the form of both his promotional video and his official school-wide campaign posters.
One of the major selling points within Grant’s campaign platform was an effort to bring events back to in-person, an experience unknown to many Grade 9s, 10s, and 11s within The Woodlands community. “Many people, especially the Grade Nines, haven’t been able to experience an event in person.” Grant says, taking great care when touching upon his most crucial electoral promises. “One of my main [platform points] was to make sure that events in person this year can be enjoyable not only for our grade, but for the school as a whole.” Some of these events include The Woodlands’ annual Semi-Formal event, as well as the long-postponed annual Carnival that may be familiar to a current batch of Grade 12 students at The Woodlands today. For Grant, the lack of events in previous years has truly upped the ante for many students, significantly transforming what they expect and search for in the school’s plans and future events. Transparency, communication, and accessibility are just as crucial as the entertainment factor. Grant looks to speak for everyone, creating events that are enjoyable to those of all identities. Promotion of voices that have previously been relatively disengaged from SAC events in the past is something very important to him, and in his ideal event vision, no student is left overlooked.
This central philosophy has informed much of his approach to SAC duties and responsibilities across the past few months, as well as the system of communication he has facilitated within his grade level. “Most obviously, [we] used online platforms,” he states, going through the layers of SAC-student communication and feedback he has utilized over the last few months. “But also most importantly, communicating in person. There’s a lot of people that you…don’t talk to online, but you talk to in person. I just generally like using online platforms [as well as] in person communication, just because I’m friends with a lot of different people. And there’s a lot of different people in my classes, we’re spreading the word in there. We’re possibly planning to have a few SAC Ambassadors, or [delegated] SAC members in classes, and they can help spread the word.”
Communication has been the main focus of Grant’s SAC-related pursuits to date, but he has plenty more planned for both his grade and the wider school community in the very near future. As a communicator and surveyor of opinion, he has individually reached out to different Grade 11 demographics in order to consolidate the opinions of his fellow peers. This includes evaluating the student reception to SAC events such as Pumpkins & Polaroids and Holiday Week, as well as feedback regarding the preferred communication mediums of his grade level. In the future, he looks forward to participating in the planning of in-person events, as well as working towards a more collaborative system for student conversation and constructive feedback for the future.
Grant is very clearly invested in his endeavors as a Grade Rep, both in his personal fulfillment and for the enjoyment and benefit of the students around him. He remains devoted to making this a great and eventful year for everyone in The Woodlands School community. If you still hold doubts over his level of enthusiasm and commitment, simply approach him in the halls. One eager conversation later, and you might just change your mind.
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