From Apathy to Presidency
My Key Club story begins like that of so many others: with a visit to my very first Key Club meeting. I was a freshman at Homewood High School, it was 7:15 in the morning, and I most definitely did not want to be there. I can vaguely remember getting reprimanded for eating in the small theater where our first meeting was held, but mostly I remember a pervasive annoyance at having to be up so early for a club that, to me, just seemed like any other at my high school.
Indulge me in backtracking just slightly. I was sitting in the Bailey Theater at Homewood High School on that August morning first and foremost because my parents had informed me that I would be. In their infinite wisdom, they had told me that if I expected to be able to get into college as a senior, then I would need service hours (and a lot of them), and that to get those I should join Key Club. Although I wasn't particularly gung-ho about signing up, I wasn't particularly adverse to the idea, either. In all honesty, I probably would have ended up joining anyway; I'm the type that joins every club at school just to keep myself busy and involved. Thus, with little input on my part, I found myself at my very first Key Club meeting. Little did I know how much Key Club would shape my life in the years to come.
That first year, I was a fairly typical club member. I went to projects and served my fifty hours and then some, but I was not exceptionally involved. I couldn't have even named the offices of my home club, much less told you that Key Club extended to the divisional, district, and International level. However, a strange series soon set into motion a chain of events that would change my life forever.
At Homewood, band is the thing to do. We have over 300 members, have been to Macy's more times than any other band outside of New York, have been to the Rose Bowl and Ireland, are in the top 100 Communities for Music Education in America...so naturally, I was involved, both of my own accord and because my parents again informed me that I was going to be. Over a third of my school is in the band, so it wasn't particularly strange that a bubbly sophomore named Madison just so happened to be in the clarinet section, and that we just so happened to become friends through long, hot hours of band practice. Madison had a sister named Courtney who was on the dance line. Courtney was (and still is) loud, perky, assertive, and, quite frankly, a little bit scary. You can imagine my anxiety when Madison pulled me aside one day to ask if I would meet her sister to talk to her about Key Club. I didn't even know Courtney was in Key Club, much less why she would want to talk to me about it, but I tentatively agreed, primarily out of nervousness and the desire to be a little more accepted and a little less "freshman." We arranged to meet in the band room before school one day so that Courtney could fill me in on the details of this "Key Club" business.
The morning came all too quickly, and I entered the band room rather apprehensively, looking for Courtney. She wasn't hard to spot. "Rebeccaaaa ohmygosh come on we have so much stuff to talk about! You're just going to love Key Club so here's a brochure on CMN and DCON is coming up so you'll have to be at that and then ICON is like DCON except better oh and all this is for LTG which means Lt. Governor...it's a great job, you like go around, visit clubs and stuff, go to board meetings...you'll love it, it's great. But anyway, you'll need to Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF cause it's one of our Service Partners and by the way here's my giant binder full of papers--sorry it's so disorganized haha!!!--so just pretty much look at that and it'll be helpful...and then rally at Spain Park and bring school supplies! Got it? Great, awesome, so glad you're in, call me if you have questions, bye!"
Needless to say, this encounter left me in somewhat of a state of shock. I was left with a binder, papers literally going everywhere, and still no idea of what was going on. Eventually, I deciphered that Key Club had something to do with service, and that I should be at Courtney's Spring Rally a few weeks later. I made myself a note and, sure enough, found myself standing on stage at Spain Park as the new Division 5 Lieutenant Governor just a few weeks later.
That was all well and good...for about thirty minutes, at which point I actually learned what I had gotten myself into. When I found out that I would have to attend Alabama's District Convention in Prattville just a few weeks later, I was not happy. I just knew that the convention would be crawling with nerds, freaks, dorks, weirdos, and, worst of all, the dreaded gamers. When later arrived, I could be found fuming in my dad's car all the way to Prattville, because not only was I loath to meet the rabble that I thought would be in attendance at convention, I was additionally annoyed because of all the make-up work I would incur in the process. However, the moment I set foot amongst the other lieutenant governors who were going to be serving alongside me, I realized that these were not gamers or freaks, but intelligent, driven, passionate individuals much like myself, and I instantly fell in love. All my pre-conceptions, annoyances, and preoccupations about schoolwork melted away, and DCON passed in a happy whirlwind. Thus began a year full of newsletters, club visits, board meetings, divisional council meetings, service projects, and more.
Soon it was March 2011, and DCON rolled back around once again. This time, I was a year older, a year more educated, and a year more in love with Key Club. I decided to run for endorsement for International Trustee, and I was elected that summer in Phoenix, Arizona to the International Board, where I served the districts of Kansas, Georgia, and Texas-Oklahoma for another year before I found myself in Orlando, Florida, this time running for the office of International President. On Saturday, July 7, 2012, I was elected by the delegates at International Convention to serve as the 2012-2013 Key Club International President, marking the start of a long year filled with travelling, schoolwork, emailing, college applications, organizational management and oversight, and very little sleep. Now, almost four years since that first Key Club meeting and a lieutenant governorship, trusteeship, and presidency later, I look back and realize what Key Club has meant in my life over the course of my high school career. While my Key Club experience has been memories, hardships, friendships, growth, and lots of hard work, Key Club means something different to every one of us. So, now that you’ve heard my Key Club story, what’s your story? Or, more importantly, what will be your story? The world is waiting to find out.















