Liv Pitcher ’23
Staff Writer
This past summer, Liz Sevigny ’23 was elected as an international trustee of Circle K, a group devoted to promoting service projects within communities. According to Sevigny, Circle K allows members to develop leadership skills while working to enrich the world around them.
Sevigny, a double major in East Asian studies and computer science, spoke about how they originally became involved with Circle K.
Image of Liz Sevigny
Photo by Rebecca Gagnon ‘23
They began their journey with the group through the high school counterpart of the organization, called Key Club.
After a positive experience in high school, Sevigny wanted to continue in college. They said, “I wanted to bring Circle K with me wherever I went, because I knew that I would have a support system; I knew that I could continue to serve my community.”
In order to fulfill this wish, Sevigny chartered a club at Mount Holyoke, coordinating with staff and students to start the chapter.
“I applied early decision in round two, I got in and then the second post on the class Facebook page was me trying to recruit people to start a chapter of Circle K on our campus,” Sevigny said. Sevigny found several other incoming students that had been involved with Key Club in high school and expressed interest in forming a chapter on campus.
Sevigny also connected with some sophomores who also had high school Key Club experience. They helped Sevigny get involved and acquire the resources to begin the club.
The next step was to apply to district level committees, who are responsible for crafting policies that affect all chapters of Circle K. This included the Service and Fundraising Committee for the New England district and the International Finance Committee. While Sevigny was nervous they might not be appointed to any board, they were eventually appointed to the latter.
In January, Sevigny decided to run for a position as a Circle K international trustee. While elections are normally held in the summer, a space had opened up unexpectedly and Sevigny’s peers encouraged them to run.
“ I [ran] and I didn’t get [the position],” Sevigny said. “Which was okay, because I think one of my big philosophies with this organization is that some of the best officers and leaders are the ones that failed to achieve the position the first time that they ran, and they can learn a lot from that. I was like, ‘Okay, it hurts a little, but I understand.’”
Sevigny would not run again until that following summer. They decided to use the time in between to refresh their campaign.
To Sevigny, campaigning is not for the faint of heart. It involves requesting endorsement from one’s home club and the district officers — in this case, those representing New England.
“[New England] has not had a lot of international representation,” Sevigny mentioned. “I believe I’m officially the second international officer to get elected from New England.”
Sevigny’s favorite part of campaigning was the Meet the Candidates segment. “It’s kind of an open house … where you’re in your own breakout room,” Sevigny said. “Members can just circle around. I got to know a lot of different members within our district and in our organization overall. I also got to hear some of their more unique concerns.”
Sevigny campaigned on issues related to membership development and diversity, equity and inclusion. “As a kind of traditional service organization, our membership is mostly middle class to upper class white people,” Sevigny noted. “There’s a lot of identities that are kind of marginalized, as in most organizations. So, I really wanted to focus on bringing those forward.”
After extensive campaigning, Sevigny won their seat in the summer of 2021 as an international trustee and was charged with overseeing various districts and running the social media platforms for them. In addition to being appointed to the Membership Experience Committee, Sevigny is part of a charter task force, a response to dwindling membership.
“I feel like we’re losing [members] to sororities and fraternities that are kind of doing the same service idea, but they also have this cohesive family unit and a lot of tradition,” Sevigny explained. “We’re trying to combat that by creating some new clubs and getting a little bit more life into the organization, especially after we took a hit with COVID-19, as most clubs did.”
Sevigny is excited about the future of the organization. Currently, they are working on a grant writing workshop to be hosted in October.
But, Sevigny is also studying abroad this semester. “I feel a little bit disconnected,” they said.“But I’m also really excited about the things I can do when I return, so spring semester is really exciting for our organization.”