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An Ever Changing TREND
The Future of the TREND Academy
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By Makani Reith Fifita
TREND has gone through many changes within the span of 4-5 years with the clubs being put on hold due to quarantine, to many of the TREND teachers leaving, but most importantly the TREND directors who lead and coordinate the academy as a whole and the students as well. Senior Shihb Altareb who co-leads the club AutomaDons hasn’t been affected but it has brought challenges towards the school.
“In regards to the clubs it definitely added some hurdles for us. And definitely some scheduling conflicts. With our advisor, she is a very busy person so we have to work alongside her schedule. Not many issues but it has brought some change.” Altareb said.
TREND’s leadership has been a rotating gear for the past four years, as the academy has gone through three different leads such as Joshua Kangas and Brian Ortiz. But now the newest lead for the academy is Jennifer Rodrigues. Rodrigues was a part of the previous three academies, Futures but also Health and Medicine a years prior and she was even the main lead for Tech Links as well before joining TREND. This will be the beginning of TREND’s rise again after the massive change in leads to Rodrigues’s new role as director and having the communications between the school and the presidents of all the academy’s clubs.
Becoming the new lead for a position is a challenge because after experience from leading Tech Links, for Rodrigues, this will be a new learning curve and considering it’s the beginning of the year where COVID restrictions are slowly being lifted and more activities and events.
“I was a little nervous just because I know there were a few amazing things done last year for the academy and so I just wanna make sure that those TREND students still have those opportunities,” Rodrigues said.
Being activities director and head of the student events and activities, while being TREND lead and director is a complete difference since Rodgrigues would fund and have to coordinate events for the school. As a whole while for TREND it’s more of communications between her and the students about the clubs.
“For fundings everything is separate. So the ASB accounts are separate from the TREND accounts. So it’s fundraising through the activities we do such as the ASB stickers and stuff like that and the money for that is gone to the events we do. And for the money for TREND comes from the CP8 Grants and the other grants that the district has and so all that funding is for that. As for the clubs, if they want to fundraise and stuff they can, then they could spend things that way.” Rodrigues said.
While being in communication with students about funding for the clubs, there are a few protocols that the director of the clubs would need to follow in order to have the materials or items that the students need.
“Rodrigues manages most of the funds for the clubs. So for Automa-Dons, I would have to compile a list of what the club wants and I’ll just send them to Rodrigues. And Rodrigues would decide whether it will be approved by the district and the district would buy off from the list.” Fan said.
One of the co-presidents for Automa-Dons, Shihb Altareb worked his way to becoming the lead of the club, and has seen the constant change of TREND leads, feels frustrated with the inconsistent leadership.four years.
“Honestly TREND is kinda inconsistent because over the past few years, we had different directors and leads, so I am really not too sure to see where TREND is going. It’s all a downward slope.” Altareb said
After applying for a leadership role in the academy last year, the Rodrigues agreed about the inconsistent flow of the academy and how many factors affected the students who were really active in the academy.
“It’s very difficult, especially when you just have to try and keep that cohesiveness and not let people feel defeated by it. So my hope is that we keep that moving forward” Rodrigues said.
Even though there has been a rough few years for the academy it’s finally getting the footing back up with more events for the academy students and hoping that it will grow for years to come. Learning from the students and support from the others helped with the new beginning when working with the academy might help TREND return to a former and better self in the future.
“So we’re trying to get different opportunities for students and for this year we’re trying to improve the maker space, and the whole engineering experience. But it’s been bumpy because with Kangas leaving then Ortiz leaving, there are still some upsides. But in the future, we’ll definitely get out of this divot. Everyones gonna know how to lead TREND and Jrod’s going to be able to handle scheduling and work the academy more in the future. So hopefully it’ll go up more in the future, like the engineering experience for students within their high school career.” Altareb said.
“I’m looking forward to the future engineers. All of the guest speakers coming in and the new equipment and tools, and also the students in the clubs.“ - Senior Damon Li
“I wouldn’t necessarily say I’m excited since I obviously won’t see some of my favorite mentors as much or at all anymore. Although a change of pace and new perspectives are really nice sometimes. I hope TREND is run a bit more smoothly and people enjoy the academy more since there are so many opportunities and great aspects to it.”
- Senior Bella Hernandez
“I’m looking forward to increased organization within the makerspace because with new leadership, we have the opportunity to look at how we’ve been running the academy with a fresh perspective. Obviously Ortiz was a pillar of the Arroyo community, but in TREND especially he really built the foundations of what we want to do with the makerspace and TREND clubs.”
