Clubs at school play an important role in unleashing opportunities to learn outside of the classroom. They help students develop social skills, sense of unity and teamwork- learning how to work with others in reaching the same goals, among others.

However, a few students are willing to join these clubs at school, even those that do; most of them are non-active members.

Although it is the school’s duty to encourage students to join these after-class activities found in clubs, sometimes students shun away from them because of how dull and uninteresting they can be, which is one of the main factors they lack members.

"Before we look at how to make these clubs vibrant, schools should be able to promote these clubs with reliable facilitation and capacity building. Because students are more equipped with real-world life skills that open them to challenges of adulthood and how to deal with those problems at an early stage,” Andrew Kalisa, a teacher at Saint Ignatius High school says.

He adds that some people have found their purpose from activities done from these clubs, since some have got opportunities to explore their different areas of interest, increased self-confidence, built leadership skills and now are great leaders.

Ways to make school clubs more active:

Flexible leadership

Kalisa says that, for every community to gain its strength, it requires strong, reliable and flexible leaders. 

"The mobilising team must be cheering and socially good oriented people, with flexibility skills than other members to always have more participants who are active in the club,” he says.

Organise connection opportunities

One of the things that interest people is, knowing that they are going to meet new people. The expectations of new strangers, depending on the occasion, are always positive towards people.

According to Samantha Umuhoza, a student at Green Hills Academy, clubs are more fun with many activities going on there.

"They should be able to arrange seminars or conferences, where they invite other schools for competitions and discussions. Through that, students are able to make connections and interact with others, while attracting new members into the club,” she says.

Umuhoza continues that club representatives should have a schedule, probably for a whole semester, to alert the audience about what’s coming up and they should make sure to execute the plans.

"They should act like real leaders who are concerned about their communities, to make sure every member is well observed and served, to attract new members with their own exception,” Umuhoza says.

 Sustainability

Leaders of the club must be sustainable to their own slogan, since they are likely to lose old members every year as they graduate. They should be resilient to attract new sustainable members and if possible, they can present their well-organised plans to the school administration to help them in mobilisation.

Meet often

When club members meet often, they are able to keep up with their responsibilities and have the club at heart. 

"For instance, at my former school, the club I belonged to always met for a break of 15 minutes, where we discussed a few of what was on our agenda. The club was very active, having all members engaged. Choose time for meet-up that is favourable and convenient for most of the members, to avoid interrupting them with their other business, and the meeting shouldn’t take so long to avoid boredom,” Umuhoza shares.

Keep it fun

The most important strategy when it comes to ensuring your club attracts new members and keeps it lively, is to learn the taste of your group members and go ahead with planning. Make sure you impress potential members with a fun experience, it will keep them coming and eventually will join your club.