Trinity is filled with opportunities for students to engage themselves outside of the classroom. A recent addition to this extracurricular list is Rho Kappa. Established in 2000, Rho Kappa is a Social Studies Honors Society. It’s mission is to expand one’s knowledge of history, while also aiding the civic community by emphasizing the importance of the past for the future. The society was brought to Trinity by our new APUSH teacher, Mrs. Grenz. Grenz was actively involved with Rho Kappa at her previous school, Hagerty, and decided to continue its mission at Trinity. 

“It’s a really great opportunity for students to extend [themselves] outside of the social studies classroom. Rho Kappa is more than just history, it’s about using those skills to help out the community and school. Those who are interested in Social Studies can see how those skills can be used in the real world”, Grenz said. 

For Grenz, the main goal is to firmly establish the society at Trinity with a large and involved student body. While at Hagerty, members had numerous community projects, such as peer tutoring, service projects for Veterans, and fundraising. Grenz says that the society is also involved with Black History Month and usually has a scholarship program to reward seniors. If brought to Trinity, the scholarship could award 3 seniors with $500 based on the essays they send to the foundation.  

The society also recently inducted their first group of presiding officers. The officers of Rho Kappa are Ellie Fetter (‘21) as President,  Maggie Yuan (‘21) as Vice President, Gabby Matusiak (‘21) as Vice-President Projects, Amy Qiao (‘21) as Treasurer, Bennett O’ Connor (‘21) as Secretary, and Tsehai de Souza (‘21) as Social Media. 

Vice President Yuan decided to join Rho Kappa because of her love for history. She states that long term goals for the organization should be community service events similar to what Mrs. Grenz had previously. To achieve this Fetter and Yuan hope to have interested students spread awareness of the new society to increase participation. They have already planned numerous service activities for this semester, with a volunteering opportunity available for the History Bowl on December 7th and a veterans program called K9s for Warriors. Yuan and Fetter also hope to bring Teen court to Trinity, a program run by the Seminole County Sheriff’s Department that lets juveniles experience the legal system. Grenz says that she’s had lots of students take part in this program that lets them be physically involved in both prosecution and defense. 

Community service will define the club according to Yuan. After legitimizing the society at Trinity, the Rho Kappa officers hope to expand our realm of ideas by forming bonds with other schools. 

“The service we do will set us apart from other societies at school. Most societies only meet their service requirements with peer tutoring, but the officers wish to have students more actively involved with the community, which is why Rho Kappa has a 3 hour volunteering requirement”, Yuan said.