Every year, SPA gives the opportunity to create spaces to express their individual or interests or identities through affinity groups or clubs. These groups are advertised during early September at the annual club fair. This year, a number of new clubs were featured at the club fair, including the South Asian Student Alliance (SASA) affinity group, the Marine Conservation club (MCC), the American Sign Language (ASL) club, the Model UN, and the Tabletop Role Playing Games (TTRPG) club.

TTRPG is co-led by Sophomores Jack Hickman and Louis Fratzke. The club is focused on introducing new players and bringing in old players to play games such as Dungeons and Dragons (D&D) and Pathfinder as a community.

“I just wanted to create a space for people to play D&D,” Hickman said. “My plan is to get a list of people and split them into smaller groups. I’m looking for some people who have experience running games, and I’m going to talk new players through the process of creating their first character.”

In order to create a new club, the sophomores had to undergo an extensive process of recruiting enough students and faculty advisor, along with finding a space for the club. TTRPG plans on meeting every Tuesday after school in RedLeaf Commons.

SASA strives to create a safe space for people of South Asian descent. SASA is co-led by Seniors Anisa Deo, Audrey Senaratna, and Wafa Naqvi. Deo was a part of the Asian Student Alliance (ASA) last year but wanted to create something more curated for South Asian students.

“We need something for South Asian students as well. Both the leaders of ASA are East Asian, and they’re great but it’s obviously hard for them to cater more to South Asian. So that’s why we created SASA. We’re just gonna talk about how it feels to be a South Asian student at SPA. And also just have fun. I feel like that’s important,” she said.

From role-playing games to affinity groups, clubs attempt to offer a place for everyone to discover new interests and partake in embracing identity.

SASA meets in room 5215 during Friday tutorial, TTRPG meets Tuesday after school in Redleaf Commons, MCC meets in room 6145, ASL club meets in room 6135 and Model UN meets in room 4220. MCC, ASL, and Model UN all meet during scheduled club time.