Q: What’s it like to be an officer in FBLA?

A: It’s really fun, and you get to see a lot of aspects that most people don’t see. FBLA is looked at as a boring club, and I know that from talking with students. But as an officer, I love my team and they’re so fun. I love being part of the team, I look forward to officer meetings and I enjoy being in a position of power – especially in such a successful student-run organization.

Q: What is your role in FBLA?

A: I have the position of VP of Socials. Basically, I plan socials for the club, but I take it more as an opportunity to just help people make friends that have the same interests as them, especially because they’re all in the same club.

Q: What other clubs do you participate in?

A: This year, I joined the Speech and Debate team. It’s really fun, actually. I won two out of three rounds at my tournament the other day, and I really love it, it’s really fun. I’m going to another tournament next week.

Q: How is Speech and Debate different from FBLA in terms of competitions?

A: In terms of competitions, I would say that Debate is definitely more intense, and it’s more of a workload. When it comes to FBLA, you can choose to not do a speaking event, but with Debate, you have to be outward, you have to have that skill of public speaking, so you really don’t have a choice. The only thing you pick and choose is what you debate about or how you debate it.

Q: What impact has being in FBLA had on you?

A: It’s definitely helped me make friends and it’s given me a place in high school. Going into high school, I had no idea what I was going to do or who I was going to become, but FBLA has definitely become an aspect of my life and my personality. It’s definitely taught me a lot about how to work with a team and how much it takes to run what may seem like the simplest things.

Q: What are you planning to do after high school?

A: I want to major in business, likely a management position, and I want to minor in philosophy because philosophy has always been a big interest of mine.

Q: How do you think philosophy and business are related?

A: One of the biggest things about business is being able to have communication and analyzation skills, especially because you’re not dealing with graphs and statistics and everything logical all the time. You’re dealing with real human people and real things, and philosophy’s a really good aspect of that. Knowing how some people think and what some people believe in will help you be more successful in a business aspect. I don’t know how to explain that exactly, but if you know the way someone thinks and what they believe, you’ll be able to conform your words or your actions and use that to your advantage.

Q: How do you aim to change the way people view philosophy as a subject?

A: So, I know a lot of people think this way, but it’s really just because they don’t know deeper things about philosophy. For example, if one of your friends had an issue and another one of your friends had a bigger issue, helping either one of those friends at different times would be a moral decision that has philosophy incorporated into it. And so, when most people think that philosophy is like this ‘olden days, Socrates, the trolley problem,’ or whatever, I just want to impact on them that philosophy is something that has to do with our everyday lives.

Q: How do you see philosophy incorporated into FBLA?

A: Sometimes, as VP of Socials, my main job is to help FBLA members interact. And so, last year, one of our biggest issues in FBLA was that everyone would create their own cliques within the club and we didn’t have a uniform club, we just had groups within groups. So that’s something I wanted to change this year. 

Q: What are your aspirations, in regards to business?

A: So, one of my biggest goals in life is forming my own company, and I want to incorporate my interests in that. I really want to start a fashion or cosmetics company. Both fashion and cosmetics are huge interests of mine. I always joke that if I had put the same effort into school as I put into picking out my outfit every day, I would be valedictorian. So, just based on that metaphor, I’m very interested in fashion and if I enjoy something, I’m going to put work into it. And if I put work into it, it’ll likely be successful.