Belleville Township High School East - Yearbook (Belleville, IL)

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THE BIGGEST CLUB OF ALL Let me ask you a few questions. Did you like the Yeah, I’m gettin ' it on real strong. way Student Council ran things this year? If you think you could have done a better job, why didn ' t Someday you may have to get it on strong out you do something about it? Did you ever say while there. And it starts here and now. you were watching a basketball game, That was a stupid play ? Well, why weren ' t you out there doing it right? But then I ' m just as guilty as you are. If school is a training ground for life, then we need to develop our talents and our skills. Ath¬ letics, school government, and the school ' s music and publications are training for similar fields outside. The letters, pins, certificates, and Brownie buttons aren’t going to mean anything in a few years. It ' s going to be the training and the experience they brought you. Maybe I should have gone out for a sport or two, but I didn ' t. It ' s too late for me now; I ' ll be gone next year. But one of my friends, one of our long-haired brothers, gave me some advice, al¬ though he didn ' t know it. When you ' d meet him your conversation would go something like this. Hey dad, what’s happenin’? You gettin’ it on? easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps Emerson

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DUfUSfL CLUB: Hey you, did you go out for a sport this year? How about one of the clubs, were you in one? What about the studnet council, or the band, or the choir? How about the National Honor Society? Did you even care? Well then, welcome to the club... ' The Average Student Who Didn ' t Do Anything But Go To School Society. We ' re probably the largest club in the school. The requirements for membership were simple. All you had to do was go to school and not engage in any extra-curricular activities. But what is school for anyway? Is it for sporting events and social activities or for learning? If it ' s for education, then that ' s what I came for. And that ' s all that I came for. But then again, what if it isn ' t? What if what they say about school it true; that school is a miniture society. In other words what you do in your school life is, on a small scale, what you will do when you get out into society. It looks like that if that statement is true, then about all we will pro¬ bably do in society is the minimum amount that is required of us. Well, I ' m not going to give you the old you owe it to your school routine, because I personally don ' t believe it. I don ' t believe that you own the SCHOOL anything. Instead, I ' m going to give you the you owe it to yourself bit. How come? Because whether you like it or not people out there are going to judge you. They ' re going to examine you and your re¬ cord, and if they don’t like what they see, society is going to turn their thumbs down on you, old buddy. You ' re going to represent yourself out there, not the school. Let ' s take sports for instance. What ' s it going to do for you after you leave? Sure it’s going to get you a letter, maybe a girl... or two, some self-esteem, and maybe even give your school some prestige. But what afterwards? Well you might get an athletic scholarship to a college and save yourself a lot of working hours if you ' re trying to work your way through. But even if you don ' t get one at least you ' ll be better off physic¬ ally. And besides, if you ever get hooked, at least you ' ll have something to tell your kids.

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THE S0-BETII7EEN5 The members of the student council at East should, and many times do, act as the middle men between the student body and the administration. Besides their obvious duties of sponsoring dances and organizing loyalty week and A.F.S. week, council members also work to keep communication channels open and act as ombudsmen to correct what students feel to be in¬ justices and instigate possible improvements. Council investigation which has resulted in positive action includes a meeting with the assistant principals concerning school bus pro¬ blems and the formation of a committee which obtained the passage of a pass-fail system for students taking a fifth subject to be tested next fall. The ' 71 — 1 72 S. C. was instrumental in the establishment of the student lounge and in placing the juke box in the snack bar (they are engaged in a clean-up campaign of both). S. C. was also instrumental in installing a bicycle rack for cyclers by the bridge. Our student council has gone beyond school boundaries this year in their efforts. They are now representing East on a Chamber of Commerce committee to make Belleville a better place for everyone to live. S. C. has also sought to improve their meth¬ ods of procedure by having inter-school exchanges with Alton, Collinsville, Centennial and Carbondale. Like any other organ¬ ization of its size and wide range of duties, student council has its problems. Tom Helfrich, president of S. C.: The biggest problem with student council is that most of the kids are elected because they ' re popular and or good-looking; most people become popular by doing alot of talking. As a result, it is often hard to get anything done with everyone talking at the same time. I think this is beginning to change, however. I would advise anyone who plans to run for student council in the future to prepare himself for a lot of hard work. Sue Taphom, senior class treasurer: When I was elected, I really thought that it (S.C.) would be duddy with a big group of socialises but I found that what I prejudged S.C. to be was wrong. I only wish more non-council students would come to the meetings and make suggestions. Kip Edwards, senior representative: We ' d be a lot more effi¬ cient if we didn ' t work as a group but instead as small committees. .. .but I feel that we have gained a great deal of respect from Mr. McCoy this year. Not only does he listen to our ideas but he also brings up his own. Tom Helfrich, again: I think much of what S.C. has accom¬ plished this year has been a direct result of a great amount of cooperation on Mr. McCoy ' s part and, of course, all of Mrs. Marsho ' s help. Mrs. Linda Marsho, faculty sponsor of S. C. concluded: They ' re great! The officers are exceptional and they ' ve done more than I ever thought was possible in one year. Everyone is appreciative and very stisfying to work with — I love ' em. Perhaps the most ambitious undertaking of the student council this year was their investigation of the idea of open campus. Following are excerpts from the final report submitted to Mr. McCoy. The phrase open campus possesses an interesting quality. When first heard, it conjures up grandiose visions of a loose, freewheeling concept of school where students are allowed to come and do as they wish, when they wish, and without the necessary bearing of responsibility that accompanies such ac¬ tions. Obvioulsy, when hearing such things, the student is overjoyed at the prospect, while the school administrator is likely to lie awake at night, shuddering at the very thought. A further examination of this open campus reveals that none of this is necessarily true, and that the joys and fears of student and administrator are probably unfounded.... Let ' s look directly at some of the arguments first advanced by opponents of open campus. Some administrators and faculty members seem to have a natural mistrust of students. They see them as potential trouble-makers and feel that most students, if granted open campus privileges, will use them, merely to get in trouble off-campus. We of the committee take a rather dim view of that opinion. First of all, we see nothing to indi¬ cate that the majority of students are anything like this at all. In fact, quite the opposite is true. The majority of students are a responsible, fairly well-mannered group of people, and it is the minority which causes the problems such as litter, minor crimes (vandalism, shoplifting) or even major ones. And as such, we cannot condone a restriction place upon the majority in an attempt to restrict the minority... • ... it is definitely unfair to prejudge the student body as po¬ tentially guilty. Confining students from 8:30 to 3:30 to avoid trouble is roughly analagous to imprisoning every U.S. citizen for ten years because they are potentially capable of murder. Houj high ' s ihe Shudenls ?! fhis place is full of GARBAGE