The National Honor Society inducted new members and officers to represent the class of 2028 on April 21, 2026. For the class of 2028 NHS officers, Ethan Ng was chosen as president, Carter Feng as vice president, Rebecca Addison as treasurer, Cynthia Sun as secretary, Hanzhi Zhang as media chair, and Mikaela Esekheigbe as service chair.
The selection process consisted of an initial written application, after which around 20 students are selected to move on to the first round of interviews. Twelve students move on to a second round of interviews where they must pitch a community service idea to the current leadership team. The selected officers were notified of their selection through a Facetime call from the current leadership team.
“I thought it was pretty exciting and pretty scary as well knowing that there’s a lot of other very competent and very accomplished people who would run against me,” junior president Ethan Ng said. “The biggest motivation that I had going for was just knowing that I had to try no matter what.”
The multi-step application process was not just a large effort for the applicants, but also for the current officers reviewing the applications. The officers reviewed over 60 initial applications, and spent multiple hours each day in the selection process.
“We’re here two weeks straight almost every single day in enrichment and almost every single day after school discussing,” senior president Elisabeth Zoeller-McCarthy said. “It was very time intensive but it’s very rewarding.”
Out of over 60 applicants, only 12 made it to the final round of interviews, and only seven moved on to become officers. Therefore, the intensive selection process caused some apprehension from the applicants. However, the current officers understood their situation because they had gone through a similar process themselves.
“I think when I was interviewing the new officers this year I remembered how nervous I was but also I wanted them to know that it’s normal to be nervous,” senior vice president Hannah Xie said. “You don’t really need to fear that much, we all went through it ourselves so we understand the nervousness that you have and it’s okay, just be yourself and everything will be fine.”
Since the officers had already gone through the exact selection process before, they made the environment comfortable, and understood when the new applicants were nervous. Junior treasurer Rebbecca Addison said that this shared experience made her more comfortable during the interview process.
“Everyone was super friendly and even though I was nervous I felt pretty comfortable and it was an overall good experience,” Addison said.
The NHS officers who applied this year are dedicated to making an impact in community service and leadership. Leading the NHS provided an opportunity to create tangible impact within the community, and this opportunity led many applicants to apply for the officer position.
“I really like helping other people and I think that providing service is one of the best things we can do to give back to a supportive community,” Ng said.
The new officers are looking forward to different aspects of being on the leadership team and NHS such as working on service projects and collaborating with the senior officers.
“As an officer next year the thing I’m most looking forward to is the service projects and being able to help plan things and volunteer within my community and my school and make a good impact,” Addison said.
Between organizing 300-member meetings and community-wide service projects, NHS officers emphasize the importance of collaboration and keeping an open mind when it comes to disagreements.
“I would advise the juniors to be really open-minded and to be willing to put in that effort,” Zoeller-McCarthy said. “We have a lot of different personalities, interests and backgrounds on our officer team, and I think that ultimately the NHS is a very, very rewarding officer team to be a part of.”
