Often you hear grumpy old men complain about kids today. The popular phrase, “What’s wrong with kids today?” I would argue that people who say that are either unaware of things, or are just grumpy and old.
Many may not be aware, but for over 100 years, students at Galesburg HS have been actively involved in student service organizations. While students in many sports, clubs and organizations have done and continue to do service projects, since 1921 GHS has always had clubs that are exclusively devoted to service.
Teaching students about science, social studies, math, and English are important to preparing students to have options as they go forward in life. One of the most important lessons is to teach students about the value and the importance of service to others.
GHS students involved in service organizations are learning…
1- Leadership skills.
2- The value and skills involved in working as a team.
3- An appreciation for and the value of community.
4- Personal growth that occurs thru a willingness to act selflessly to help others.
For over 100 years, Galesburg High School has been helping develop active and valuable members of society. GHS is helping students grow as people who want to serve others.
Today, the two primary service organizations at GHS are Key Club and Interact Club. These two clubs combined presently have memberships of 140 students. In perspective, that is about 10% of GHS students involved in one of these two clubs.
(Please note- There are other clubs, organizations, and sports teams who are actively involved in service at the school and in the community. I have just chosen to look at two historic GHS programs- Girls Service League and the Boys Forum. As I look at these programs, I have tried to examine what they evolved from and what they evolved into.)
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| 1931- Boys’ Hi-Y Club |
History of GHS Service Clubs
Boys Hi Y- 1921-1932
The majority of its activities were designed to develop fellowship for male students and support GHS sports and organizations. Among their activities…
** Retreat for males to a camp
** Sponsor sports banquets
** Collect and repair toys for the poor.
** Host a Christmas party for returning GHS alumni
** Sponsor banquets for the forensics groups
** Donate vocational counseling books to the library.
Girls Hi-Y- 1922-1930
This organization was founded on the following principle: “To create, maintain, and extend higher standards of Christian living throughout the school and the community.” According to the Reflectors, the Girls Hi-Y had 200-250 girls as members.
As I research, it is always fun when you come across people or names you recognize. One of the officers of the 1929 Girls Hi-Y was Marjorie Evans. I am proud of my mom!!
Their projects included…
** Raising money and donating clothes to charities at Christmas.
** Sponsor a Christmas school assembly
** Bring in speakers for assemblies
** Aid the Christmas seals campaign.
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| 1931 Girls Service League |
Girls Service League- 1931-1986
In 1931, the Girls Hi Y reorganized and renamed itself as “Girls Service League.” The GSL over the next 5 decades was the largest and most effective service organization in GHS history. When it first started in the 1930’s and for most of its existence, one female from each home room was a representative to the GSL leadership council.
The GSL as an entire group met once per month and each class met weekly. Meetings included Bible Study, and Fine Arts education.
Throughout most of its existence, the GSL ran an elaborated orientation for first year female students. As part of the orientation, they spelled out appropriate behavior for different situations and also had a fashion show to point out typical dress for different GHS activities- class, sporting events, and dances. While today a fashion show might seem odd, think about the stress young students entering GHS must have felt- the orientation helped relieve some of that stress.
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| 1962- Both pictures are the homeroom reps For GSL. |
GSL provided “Big Sisters” for incoming students to help give them guidance. The GSL published a weekly newspaper for female students.
GSL was involved in supporting charities from Red Cross, March of Dimes to Disable Veterans. By the ‘50’s, the GSL sponsored two Korean children. In the ‘50’s, the GSL developed a theme centered around “Pennies for Pablum,” to raise money for poor children throughout the world. This “Pennies” theme became part of GSL for over two decades- as they got donations for using slogans like, “Penny Prance.”
At Christmas season, the GSL would bake cookies for local nursing homes as well as getting toys and dolls for poor children.
By the ‘70’s, GSL traditions included decorating goal posts for home football games, making a directory of all students, giving flowers to teachers on the first day of school, and sponsoring the first dance of the year- a post game “Pigskin Prance.”
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| 1969 Girls Service League Officers Row 1- K. Swanson (Treas.), B.Eichhorn (VP) Row 2- C. Hines (Sec), Mrs. Byram, C. Carmen (Pres) |
The GSL also had regular potlucks together and the highlight of the year was an end of year banquet where individual members were recognized for service.
While there had been over 300 members in the ‘30’s thru the ‘50’s, by 1975 the GSL still had a membership of over 150.
Whether it was the introduction of girls sports demanding more time of female students, by 1980 the GSL was down to only 6 members.
The last year of existence for the GSL was in 1986.
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| 1975 Girls Service League |
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| 1956 Boys Forum Officers Front Row- 1st- Mike Owens Second Row- 1st- Phil Erickson |
Boys Forum- 1933-1974
Boys Hi Y changed its name to Boys Forum in 1933. For much of its existence, 100-200 males belonged to the Boys Forum.
While the Boys Forum did do service projects for the community, most of their service was directed to GHS. Boys Forum sponsored assemblies, and promoted support and involvement in clubs and sports.
A prestigious award given by the Boys Forum in the early years was the “Boy of the Month.” They selected a male student from their group and recognized them for their service to the club, their activities at GHS, and their academic excellence.
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| 1962 Boys Forum Cabinet- Reps from Home Rooms |
In its early years, Boys Forum sponsored “Stag Nights” where male students would have evenings to come to GHS for various sports and recreational activities. In later years, the Boys Forum sponsored Intramural programs in a variety of sports. They also sponsored after school dances.
By the 1960’s, a major part of the Boys Forum was running the school’s pop machines. This gave the group great financial resources. They bought drinking fountains at the new GHS, paid for the trophy cases, and bought AC units for certain classrooms. When individual departments had a need, they could go to the Boys Forum.
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| 1966 Boys Forum Officers |
If you attended GHS from 1951 to 2020, you remember the podium used for graduation, all assemblies, and major events at GHS. You probably remember seeing, “Boys Forum 1951,” across the front of the impressive podium. For over 7 decades, the podium stood as a symbol of service at GHS. When GHS was remodeled, they chose to not use the podium any longer.
In the ‘60’s and ‘70’s, the Boys Forum had a most unusual program to serve GHS students. They provided loans to students- 40 cents if they forgot their lunch money and also would loan money for Drivers Ed fees if a student could not afford it. I am not aware of any school program anywhere which tried to actually give individual students financial assistance.
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| 1969 Boys Forum Officers |
Key Club- 1986 to the Present
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| 2026 GHS Key Club |
As the Girls Service League began to falter in 1980’s, the Key Club was started. Actually GSL and Key Club combined as one organization for two years before the name GSL was dropped. Key Club is a student service organization developed by the Kiwanis Clubs in the U.S. to help students learn the value of service.
Typically Key Club has about 25-40 members. This year they have around 80 members.
Hayleigh Green is faculty advisor for the students Key Club, I asked her to share information about Key Club…
Key Club is the high school-level service organization associated with Kiwanis International, so our local Kiwanis club serves as an important community connection for us. We try to create opportunities for our students to work alongside Kiwanis members on service projects and community events rather than operating as completely separate organizations. We volunteer at their annual Pancake Day, Child Shopping Day, and more!
Our relationship also gives students an opportunity to see what lifelong community service can look like. Key Club introduces students to service and leadership while they are in high school, and Kiwanis provides an example of how that involvement can continue into adulthood. I myself am a great example of this as I served on the GHS Key Club Board 3 out of my 4 years in high school, then later served on the Kiwanis Club of Galesburg's board before becoming a teacher. We are continuing to look for ways to strengthen that partnership and give our students more opportunities to work directly with our local Kiwanis members.
GHS Key Club focuses on both school and community service throughout the year. One of our largest ongoing projects is our Dress Closet, where we collect donated formalwear and provide dresses, suits, shoes, and accessories to GHS students for events like Homecoming and Prom at no cost.
Our members also volunteer at a variety of school and community events throughout the year. We partner with Student Council for our school blood drives, participate in community service projects such as park cleanups with our local Kiwanis Club, and help with other local events when organizations reach out needing student volunteers.
We also hold fundraisers such as Boo Pops and Crush for a Crush. While these are fun activities for the student body, the money raised helps support Key Club membership dues and allows us to continue providing service opportunities for our students and school community.
Interact Club- 2002 to the Present
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| 2026 Interact Club |
Interact Club started up at GHS around the turn of the century. It is a student service organization developed with the support of the Rotary Club.
Typically Interact Club has about 40 members. Their membership this present year is about 60 students.
Jen Robinson is the GHS faculty advisor for the Interact Club. I asked her to share information about the Interact Club…
Rotary members are very supportive of us and invite us to 2 meals per month. I send 2 students to each meal and they are able to share what we are doing and experience the world of Rotary. The Rotarians provide the meals and transportation. The Rotary club has also been good about supporting us financially. Some years they have matched our efforts for various projects and they donate when we do some fundraising. Additionally, they send some of our students to leadership conferences and transport them to and from these conferences.
The goal of Interact is "to empower young people ages 12-18 to develop leadership skills and personal integrity while engaging in community and international service.” To that end, we do a variety of service and we usually try to split our efforts between school, local, and international causes. For example, at the school we have done things for teacher appreciation, custodian appreciation and have tried to encourage others to be kind or supportive of other students. Locally, we have done "hands-on" service like working at Blessings in a Backpack, Loving Bottoms Diaper Bank, and FISH food pantry. We have raised money for many local charities such as Safe Harbor, Habitat for Humanity, and the Rescue Mission. Internationally we have done projects like buy mosquito nets, help with water projects, help refugees in the Ukraine, help fund cataract surgeries, purchase books for a library, send school and hygiene supplies overseas etc...
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| Interact Club |
National Honor Society- 1927 to the Present
A different kind of “service club” is the National Honor Society. Members are selected to the NHS by a vote of the GHS faculty. Students are selected on the basis of scholarship, leadership, character, and service.
For many years, NHS was just an honorary organization. Around the turn of the century, the advisors of the organization made an active service component part of membership. Students must be involved in service to maintain their membership.
Jen Robinson is the GHS faculty advisor. I asked her to describe the how NHS operates…
Once they are in, they are expected to do 5 hours of service in the spring and then 20 hours per semester during their senior year.
They do tutoring at the school and volunteer with kids programs and sports camp. Some volunteer at the humane society or at Loving Bottoms. The City of Galesburg provides opportunities like helping with clean-up at the parks, helping with the fishing derby, and the Easter egg hunt. The students volunteer their time at the school through blood drives and other activities that they do with student council, Interact and Key Club. One requirement is that at least half of their service hours come from somewhere outside the school. We want them to see what service they can be to the larger community as well.
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| Key Club cleaning a park. |
Students Reflect on Service
Morgan Thomas- Interact
My name is Morgan Thomas, and I am an officer of the Interact Club here at GJSHS! I love being a part of Interact because we get to do a lot of good for our school, the Galesburg community, and around the world! We raise money by fundraising to support our club, and we even have connections with another Interact Club in Brazil that we learn about life there from. If you ever have any questions about our impact, you can always email me!
I love being an interact and especially being an officer in the club as I feel that I get to make more community connections and learn more about what the community of Galesburg needs. Being part of a service club has helped me realize how much good a group of people can do for others and has helped me grow by reminding me to put those around me before myself!
Ellie Johnson- Interact
I am part of the Interact Club at GHS. Being in Interact has really brought me closer to the community. Although I am involved in sports, clubs like Interact put my name out for people to know me, along with more opportunities to raise money for different projects and help all over the world. Not only that but everyone in Interact has fun knowing they are making a difference!
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| 1969- GSL packing cookies for nursing homes. |
Henry Ikrami- Interact
Being a member of Interact Club, I have had the opportunity to meet many new people at the high school and work with them to make our school and community a better place. Along with this, we've also had the opportunity to work with exchange students within our school and help support projects taking place in their home countries. I've greatly enjoyed my time with Interact and I've loved being able to see the impact my classmates can make by working together.
Damanjot Kaur- National Honor Society
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| 1969- GSL’s Soph Orientation- Fashion Show |
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