Bram Klemek, a Global freshman, was recently elected president of the Class of 2026. The Pulse wanted to ask him about his campaign and the changes he wanted to make for the future of the school.  He has intentions to make interschool communication better and has received warm welcomes from upperclassmen SGA members.

Welcome to Poolesville! How does it feel to be elected the Freshman Class President?

I am very honored that the freshman student body thinks that I am the best candidate for the job.

What motivated you to run for office?

I wanted to make the school experience for the class of 2026 better in as many ways as possible. 

Can you describe your outreach strategy? How did you reach students in your grade?

I contacted students outside of school to try and create a bigger network and figure out what the students wanted from the freshman SGA.

What do you plan to bring to Poolesville with your presidency?

I want to build lines of communication between administration and students so problems can be solved quickly. 

In addition to your presidency, what other school activities do you participate in?

I run on the cross-country team and participate in a basketball fall league.

How did your interactions with upperclassmen influence your decision to run?

The upperclassmen were super supportive of my campaign, specifically, Jordan Su gave me a lot of advice that helped my campaign.

How has your experience as a Freshman at Poolesville been so far?

It has been very enjoyable with lots of new experiences and friends. I can’t wait to continue my journey. 

This year during freshman SGA elections, Tanvi De, a freshman Humanities student, was newly elected as vice president. She intends to include the student voice heavily in her decisions and wants to create a community where classmates are able to voice their opinions freely and easily. She wants to host many fundraisers in order to made fun social events possible and to implement team-building opportunities for the student body. 

What motivated you to run for VP?

Starting high school, I had to quickly adjust to many new experiences all at once. This was extremely difficult for me, one of the hardest parts being making new friends and putting myself out there. Although it was tough to find my place, I always knew that I wanted to be a part of something larger at PHS. This was one of my biggest pushing factors. I also had many upperclassmen friends on SGA who helped motivate me to put myself out there. 

How has your vice-presidency been going? 

Overall, my vice-presidency has been hectic and stressful. Even before being elected, I faced campaigning. This was extremely stressful because I had to force myself to speak to many new people and push myself out of my comfort zone. After elections, I could barely celebrate my success before being thrown into Poolesville Day preparations. Although it was a fun and immersive experience, the hard work and dedication that my sga peers and I put into it was extremely labor intensive. Most recently, homecoming hallways have been on our agenda. Although I am having fun creating decorations, it has added more stress into my daily life and is definitely difficult for our whole team. Despite these challenges, I am extremely grateful for the opportunities the student body has provided me by voting for me, and I am so excited to see where this year takes me.

What are your goals in your presidency? 

At the beginning of my campaign, I set certain goals for myself in hopes that I would achieve them by the end of this year. That being said, I have learned a lot about sga in the few weeks that I have been in it, and this has helped to put a lot of my goals into perspective. One of my biggest goals is to host frequent fundraisers. I want to make freshman year as exciting as possible for our class, and that is why I believe that they are important. Not only will they raise money for social events and more, but they will provide a way for us to come together and work as a team. This leads to my next goal, which is to involve students as much as possible and create more access to the sga. After seeing how big of a success our Poolesville day bake sale was, I realized that we would not have been able to accomplish it without our peers who helped design our banner and supported our booth by buying and advertising. I truly believe that getting students involved with these events and preparations regularly will benefit not only the sga but our community as a whole. 

Have you run into any difficulties during your presidency? If so, how have you overcome them?

My presidency has been filled with ups and downs, which is surprising considering that it’s only been less than a month since I was elected. My biggest difficulty was Poolesville Day preparations. We started preparing the Tuesday before Poolesville day, giving us a whopping three days to complete all our work for the event. On Tuesday, we decided on a bake sale fundraiser, and on Thursday I began working on the freshman bake sale banner. We were also missing officers due to a global field trip, which left us short handed. Come Friday, the banner was complete after being worked on for about 3 and a half hours total. That Friday, I had to go to the store and purchase almost $200 worth of baking supplies, as I was the primary officer planning to bring anything to the bake sale. In order to make sure I baked enough, I made chocolate chip cookies, chai snickerdoodles, brownies, rice krispy treats, pumpkin cheesecake bars, and apple snickerdoodle muffins. Overall, I made over 100 separate items by myself. I began baking at 6:00 PM, stopped at 1:30, and then woke up again at 6:00 to finish baking the muffins. This was a total of 8 and a half hours dedicated to just the baking portion of the event. Not to mention me and some of my fellow officers stayed at the booth for 7 hours. This was an extremely hard challenge, but luckily it paid off because our booth sold out and we made $200. 

Another challenge I face that is unique to the other officers is that I am the only humanities student. As we all know, global students continuously miss school for global field trips. Fellow officers being absent because of field trips have interfered with our meetings and plans many times already even though it has only been a few weeks. This makes it difficult for me because I am often doing planning alone or with only one or two officers.

How are you implementing student voices into your decisions?

As stated before, I really enjoy student input when it comes to SGA planning and decision making. I would like to involve them as much as possible in such circumstances because it lets them take a hands on approach and speak to us directly rather than through a google form or something like that. I want to be able to create a community where my peers feel comfortable talking to the SGA and giving us feedback. I will hopefully achieve this by forming strong bonds and getting students excited about their class events.

Why is SGA important to you?

SGA is important to me because during Covid, I lost many of my favorite hobbies and teams. For example I lost my karate team of 7 years. Last year was difficult for me as well school-wise because after the pandemic I found it hard to keep up with my schoolwork let alone get involved with student government. This year I entered the school year with an open mindset and I wanted to have a good first impression. At first, this meant making friends and talking to new people, but when I saw the effect these actions could have on my peers, I realized I could utilize this to help better our school. SGA is so important to me because it is one of the first ways I have put myself out there, and is a useful output for me. It is a beautiful learning experience and I am excited to learn more and grow with my team.

Do you have a past in SGA? 

Personally, I have little experience with SGA. I was involved in elementary school, but my middle school was a little bit disadvantaged, and we lacked an SGA. I also went into lockdown in the middle of sixth grade, which left me really no time to get accustomed to middle school let alone figure out student government. My little previous experience with SGA made me extremely curious about it this year, and hopefully supplied me with some skills to better prepare me for my presidency.

Finally, how has your time at Poolesville been so far?

So far, my time at Poolesville has been enjoyable and unique. Something special about Poolesville is that although we are a small school, our spirit and community is so tight knit and something I have never experienced before. As a student in the humanities program, I am so grateful to have an even closer community with each other. Every teacher I have is so dedicated and I can tell that they genuinely enjoy teaching. Although the construction has made the physical building less enjoyable, I still look for the silver lining in the beautiful fields and the small-town magic that Poolesville contains. I truly believe that I belong here at Poolesville and it is my personal goal to make sure that each and every one of my peers feels the same under our SGA!