Students gathered in the Lower Left dining hall of Paresky Commons for the Winter Club Rally.
The Winter Term Club Rally welcomed new clubs to promote themselves in Paresky Commons on January 17. While this event allowed students to sign up for clubs that were not established in the fall, this term’s club rally saw lower student attendance compared to the larger and more widely-known October club rally.
While the Fall Term club rally only allowed clubs that had been renewed from the 2023-2024 school year, or had obtained special permission to set up tables, the Winter club rally was the first opportunity for clubs created in the 2024-2025 school year to properly advertise themselves.
Some students expressed mixed feelings about the club fair being located in Paresky, expressing dissatisfaction with spacing and visibility. Attendee Maya Tomlinson ’28 felt that it was difficult to reach the clubs further from the entrance and noted the cramped spaces between tables.
“Everything is pretty clustered in the middle, and it’s a little hard to navigate, especially at the entrance because there’s a big crowd here. And the clubs that are more to the outskirts are less easy to be visible, and they’re not getting as much interaction,” said Tomlinson.
Patrick Xu ’27 viewed the Winter club rally as an important opportunity for newer clubs. While he voiced support for the event, Xu noted that the newer clubs face difficulties in gaining traction due to less visibility and attendance than the fall club rally.
“I was aware of [the club rally] the day before it happened, [but] I had a lot of homework, so I didn’t attend… Most people, especially the people who want to start new clubs, like it because it’s a better opportunity without the competition of the bigger clubs. Although it’s helpful and important for the newer clubs to expand their influence in the community, it’s pretty hard and they might struggle because the fall club rally is the one most people are aware of. I would like to see newer clubs in the Fall [rally] as well,” said Xu.
Jayden Daley ’25, who attended to advertise his Rubix Cube club, also mentioned the new location. Having witnessed the various iterations of the club system throughout his four years at Andover, Daley commented on how club continuity might interact with ClubHub.
“It’s a very new experience not being in Snyder [Center], which I’m kind of weird about, but I’m having fun [anyway]… Being in an evolving club, there’s so much change going on and so much history that’s just archived and not being used within [ClubHub]. I wonder how it’s going to be organized when clubs die out,” said Daley.
Alastriona O’Donnell ’27, the head of the newly founded Sailing Club, attended the club rally to gather sign-ups for her new club. She suggested providing more space for posters in future club rallies to improve the organization.
“I [was at the Winter club rally] because I’m the head of a new club, the Sailing Club. There were definitely a lot of people here, and we got a bunch of people to sign up. Some people were walking around with their posters and some had them stationary… Maybe next year they could add more places to put the posters or provide tape so that we can put more things up and decorate the space,” said O’Donnell.
