2025 Annual Report

Read about the accomplishments of the 2024-2025 Council here!

The State of BUA

Student Council’s Annual Report, April 2025 

President, Alex Furman

Vice President, Yiannis Asikis 

Treasurer, Ajay Wadhwani

Secretary, Ally Tian 

Advisor, Victoria Perrone

Class Representatives 2024-25

Grade 12: Alex Furman, Yiannis Asikis, Ajay Wadhwani, Ally Tian

Grade 11: Angelique Pacombe Jones, Betty Araia, Lisa Zhou, Elise Despujols

Grade 10: Geneva Kelleher, Isha Venkatesh, Leone Levi D’Ancona, Frankie Grills

A Note from the Student Council President

“We’re no strangers to love,” Rick Astley once said—and my time on Student Council has taught me just how true that is at BUA. I see this love everywhere—in students’ dedication to causes, at sports games, in small acts of kindness, and in students’ passion for and dedication to extracurricular activities. In the spirit of spreading and spotlighting this love, the Officers set out to highlight the extracurricular experience at BUA. Consequently, our overarching goal for the 2024-2025 school year was to “offer BUA students a more spirited high school experience by enhancing and promoting extracurricular activities and providing welcoming student spaces”. We established STAR—Student Teams & Activities Revved-Up—and stardom ensued… 

This year we launched ClubHub to centralize club info, helping students sign up and stay informed through searchable profiles, calendars, and announcements. We then refreshed the Club Board to give current and prospective students an accurate visual representation of what clubs BUA has to offer. In our effort to establish sources of club promotion, we hosted a “Try-It Day” where Puzzle club offered an easy, engaging activity in the lobby, enabling students to experience a club without sacrificing their current commitments. In the spirit of trying new things, we interviewed Book Club, Baking Club, and Run Club in an Instagram reel series called “STAR Spotlights” to show students the exciting work of these clubs. To finish off the year, we hosted the first-ever ASM dedicated to recognizing club achievement and ambition through the Most Valuable Club Competition. Clubs in the running created videos that highlighted how their group went above and beyond their stated mission. It was a shining moment for the school to see how Yearbook designed their first-ever themed edition and JSO hosted multiple community events to educate about the culture. Puzzle Club was crowned MVC for expanding from exclusively crosswords to include Jigsaws and hosting the highly attended Puzzle Competition! When it comes to hyping each other up, BUA knows the game, and we played it. 

BUA’s academic drive is matched by deep extracurricular passion, and our year-long goal helped spotlight that balance. From sports championships to Broadway-worthy plays, what we do outside class defines us just as much. What we do outside of class plays a crucial role in determining our character. Whether it be winning championships on sports teams, taking part in broadway-worthy performances, or traveling far and wide for Model UN and robotics, these moments are central to who we are. As I reflect on my own extracurricular experience, I am grateful to have been shaped by and helped shape Student Council. I know in years to come, StuCo will not give you up or let you down, BUA. I can’t wait to hear the grapevine gush about the amazing things the next Officers will surely accomplish.

We did it, Joe. Peace out, BUA.

Alex Furman

Events Committee

Chaired by Betty Araia 

This year, the Events Committee set out with a clear mission: to increase connectivity within the school community and spread joy by organizing events that encouraged participation, collaboration, and school spirit. Through planning a range of activities, we aimed to bring students together across grade levels, foster school pride, and create lasting experiences that everyone could enjoy. Reflecting on the year, we are proud to say that we achieved these goals and more, with each event helping to strengthen the sense of community among our student body!

As a committee, we planned our traditional events like Lock-in, Homecoming, Fall Festival, and Semiformal, while working on developing and building new events. Inspired by the Netflix hit, ‘To All The Boys I’ve Loved Before’, the Events committee decided to expand our yearly Match-o-Matics Valentine’s Day event. We curated a list of songs and offered Song-a-Grams,  singing telegrams which students could purchase and send to a friend. Who doesn’t love a good serenade? While Song-a-Grams were born, Match-o-Matics continued to grow with a historic 112 students filling out the questionnaire!

Throughout spring semester, we also discussed the lack of planned events for upperclassmen bonding once entering junior and senior year. To help remedy the problem, we coordinated a new upperclassmen-specific event, Nostalgia Night, to include fun games like Fishy Fishy Cross my Ocean and the rainbow parachute. Before seniors graduate and juniors rise to their final year of high school, there is no better way to celebrate their time together than revisiting childhood memories. 

Although my time as Events Chair is wrapping up, the eventlings are still hard at work planning Field Day! Because Field Day happens just one month after Student Council elections, it has always been stressful for the new Events Chair to coordinate such a large event right away. To alleviate this stress, we set the goal to have Field Day completely planned before elections. This includes games, point distribution, and supplies. Events should aim to achieve this each year. 

This year’s events were a great success in fulfilling our mission of increasing connectivity and spreading joy. It brings me much happiness to say our committee succeeded in fostering a stronger, more connected school community. We are grateful for all the students, volunteers, and staff who supported the committee throughout the year, and look forward to continuing these traditions and building on this success in the future!

Policy Committee

Chaired by Lisa Zhou

This year, the Policy Committee centered our work around three main initiatives. Our most recent initiative was submitting a proposal to request a day off for Lunar New Year, recognizing its cultural importance for many Asian families in our community. To support the proposal, we surveyed the student body to see how many students celebrated and what accommodations they may need. We recently submitted the proposal and hope to hear back from the administration by the end of the school year. Our second initiative was to create a guide for students for how to apply for work permits in different towns. Since the process can vary depending on where students live, we designed a clear and accessible guide that is shared on the student council website and supplemented with QR codes around the school. This was an effort to make policy’s work not only accessible on paper but also for years to come online. Finally, we outlined guidelines for acceptable use of the new Student Commons space and made posters to share those with the school community. 

Looking ahead, next year’s Policy Committee should continue to find ways to enhance student experience by gathering feedback from the student body. Especially about new policies like the new school policy on extensions and phone usage.

Public Relations Committee

Chaired by Angelique Pacombe Jones 

As the 2024–2025 school year comes to a close, the Public Relations Committee is proud to reflect on a year filled with creativity, connection, and meaningful communication with the student body.  As a committee, our main focus this year was enhancing student engagement and interaction across our platforms: whiteboards, bulletin boards, posters, and instagram posts and reels. A big thank you to our members and the wider BUA community for staying engaged and giving such helpful feedback throughout the year!

This year, PR aimed to make our boards something the community can discuss, enjoy, and interact with. The two bulletin boards outside the Chem lab have stayed fun, funky, and fresh: We’ve helped you “meet the reps” and displayed “BUAcore” at the beginning of the year, “shared the love” for Valentine’s day, and made “snow many memories” this winter! Most recently, our “Munch Madness” bracket board has sparked lively debate on which BU campus restaurant is the tastiest of them all.

One of our standout initiatives on Instagram this year was the continued development and success of Terrier Talk, our weekly announcement segment. Combining important updates with humor, creativity, and relatable content, BUAers could look forward to the reel each week. In addition to Terrier Talks, we posted a couple of fun, interview-style reels featuring our beloved mini-mics. We asked questions from: What was your Spotify Wrapped like? to What was the last kind thing someone has done for you? I hope PR will continue to build on reels next year! 

Looking back, this year has shown what’s possible when energy, passion, and purpose come together. From reels to bulletin boards, whiteboards to weekly meetings, every effort was aimed at connecting our community. It has been an honor to serve as its chair this year, and I look forward to seeing this committee do amazing things!

Resources Committee

Chaired by Elise Despujols 

As we reflect on the year, one overarching theme stands out: accessibility. The Resources Committee worked diligently to make StuCo more approachable, transparent, and responsive to the needs of the student body. We focused on improving communication, increasing student engagement, and ensuring that our initiatives were accessible to all students, regardless of how they interact with school information.

A key initiative was launching the StuCo Scoop, our biweekly email newsletter that kept students informed and engaged with updates from all committees including projects and events—no Instagram required. As many students voiced concerns that Instagram is an inaccessible or impractical platform for communication, the StuCo Scoop has served as an important alternative, ensuring that no one misses out on important updates.In a survey to the school, it was rated as the top way students learned about what was happening around BUA! We also saw a notable increase in student engagement through our new Suggestions and Responses section in the StuCo Scoop. By actively responding to these suggestions, we were able to demonstrate that StuCo listens to and values student input, reinforcing the idea that all voices are important and heard.

Recognizing the importance of making new students feel welcome and informed, we introduced a Tip of the Week initiative. These tips, posted around the school each week, were designed primarily for freshmen and provided helpful insights on navigating both BUA and StuCo. Examples of a Tip of the Week included providing a list of resources for midterms and a map of where student support team offices had relocated after the opening of the Student Commons. 

Our work extended beyond digital communication through expansion of the Bathroom Boxes program. We added a chalkboard to the set up where we have written encouraging notes as a small and impactful way to promote positivity and provide information in a more engaging, low-tech manner. We’re hoping this design provides students with important resources, tips, and announcements in a space they can easily access during the school day. 

Finally, we added the slogan “Courtesy of Resources” across all our initiatives including the Green Box Return Program. This simple, consistent branding has helped students better understand the role of our committee and its impact on their daily lives. Feedback has indicated that this effort has been successful—many students now know who we are and what we do, thanks to these small but meaningful touches! I look forward to continuing to support the work of Resources next year.