Published in the Sept. 30 – Oct. 13, 2015 issue of Morgan Hill Life
Anna Synder
Getting involved in clubs during your high school years enhances the experience and teaches you many valuable skills for the future.
One very active and helpful club is Future Business Leaders of America.
FBLA is a national student organization that is very popular all over the United States and we happen to have a great chapter at Live Oak high school.
Our school’s chapter of FBLA, while small compared to other FBLA chapters, is vital to our school and community. Our chapter alone has been around for 46 years and is run by our incredible adviser, Kiki Nakauchi, who has been involved since our chapter first started.
Future Business Leaders of America offers the students of Live Oak High School essential leadership skills that they would not be able to find anywhere else.
Members of FBLA get to see first-hand how businesses work when they go on business tours. They learn how to put together a resume and prepare for an interview. They learn what to expect when they will be entering into the work force.
I can personally say that FBLA has shaped who I am today and has taught me so much about how to be a leader and work with others.
I started out my freshmen year of high school being very shy and barely answering questions in class. Then I joined FBLA and it got me involved in events and I met new people. Now I am a co-president with Samantha Sadoff and I talk in front of our 70 members every Tuesday at brunch during our general meetings.
Without FBLA I would not be as prepared for college or have developed the leadership skills I have now. Every student should look into joining
FBLA because it will help them in many ways throughout their years in high school and long after.
FBLA is also not just restricted to our school; they reach out to everyone in the community as well.
FBLA members also serve at many community service events throughout the year.
Every year we volunteer at all of Morgan Hill’s events such as the Taste of Morgan Hill and the Mushroom Mardi Gras.
Each year we help the Chamber of Commerce by selling non-alcoholic drinks at its tent during the Taste of Morgan Hill.
Also volunteering for the Mushroom Mardi Gras offers our members a unique opportunity to win a scholarship their senior year if they have volunteered for multiple years.
We have also created our own volunteering traditions in our community. Every year we put on a Thanksgiving canned food drive and create care packages for 125 families in the Morgan Hill Unified School District. These packages are filled with cans and goods donated by people in the community as well as Live Oak students and staff.
Our members always gather together during this event and dedicate many hours of work because they love this event. They get a chance to personally see the impact they are making when they deliver each package to the families homes.
Just last year FBLA wanted to reach out even more to our community, so we gave a stuffed animal bear to every single student in the third grade in the MHUSD.
The students responded by writing us letters thanking us for the bears. Many of the letters really filled our hearts and made our members feel very connected to the community. FBLA is always looking to make a difference in our school and our community.
Anna Snyder is the co-president at the Live Oak High School Future Business Leaders of America club for the 2015-2016 school year. She wrote this column for Morgan Hill Life.
