Student Activities

Commonwealth has a long tradition of student-run clubs and teams. They always enrich the atmosphere of social and community engagement at the school. Some student groups, like Debate Team, Model UN, the student newspaper, and Math Team are long-standing fixtures at the school. Others, like the Environmental and Football Clubs, were created more recently to reflect growing student interests. Every year, new clubs are added to the list as students create spaces to discuss and engage in all their favorite subjects and different facets of their identities.

I do model UN and model Congress...I love them. It gives me a lot of confidence because in both of those activities you have to speak in front of a lot of people.Sasha '21

Clubs and Organizations

ACLU Chapter

Chess Club

Coding Club

Commonwealth Cares

Commonwealth Cares is a student-led group that organizes interesting and meaningful community service opportunities around Boston for the school's annual Day of Service. Recent Day of Service activities for students have included distributing food at Bread of Life and Community Servings; assisting at nonprofit grocery store Daily Table; and spending time with elderly residents at Hale House.

Commonwealth Food Initiative

COMMUN

COMMunity

Community Service Club

D&D

Debate Team

Debate meets weekly to practice for conferences held by the Debate Association of New England Independent Schools, DANEIS, and hosted at schools in the Boston area; we attend five or six each year. Commonwealth's team participates in Parliamentary Extemporaneous debates, which are unrehearsed and done in teams of two. Most often, resolutions are in the form of a policy to be implemented by the US Congress. One two-person team defends the proposition, while a second team (representing the "opposition") attempts to refute the "government's" position. The debated propositions can range from the serious ("The US Federal government should cut off all funding for theoretical mathematics") to the goofy ("Superheroes should enjoy free healthcare benefits") to the goofily historical ("Be it resolved that Athens kicked more butt than Sparta.") Commonwealth also participates in other forms of debate (Interpretive, Impromptu, Public Speaking), and occasionally in informal scrimmages with other teams in the Boston area.

The club has nearly twenty members, of whom as many as a dozen go to each conference. Each Thursday, we conduct one full-length practice debate, and our officers work with our debate coach to provide constructive feedback to help students improve their argument formation and public speaking.

Drawing and Animation Club

Environmental Club

The Environmental Club meets to discuss issues related to the local and global environment, green technologies, and related issues. They led the charge in switching Commonwealth to running on entirely carbon-neutral power and in instituting “meat-free Mondays," and they recently started tracking the school's emissions from food preparation, events, and school-associated travel. Their goal is to further Commonwealth's and the world's march towards net zero emissions.

Evil Genius Club

Film Analysis Club

French Club

French Club members speak French, watch popular movies and shows from France, and eat French treats. It's a place to engage with the language outside of class in a more relaxed atmosphere. Past club activities have included watching Au Service de la France (A Very Secret Service) and clips of Ionesco's La Cantatrice Chauve (The Bald Singer), as well as reading plays aloud. In the spring semester, members practice various skills for the AP French exam.

Football Club

Football Club is a club that talks about the beautiful game, the most popular sport on planet Earth, the sport in which you use your foot (unlike another sport with the same name): football. Widely acclaimed (according to its founder) as the greatest Commonwealth club ever, you will learn a lot about the tactics, the inner workings, and the rules that are associated with football!

Go Club

Investment Club

Knitting Cult

The Leek

Literary Magazine (Helicon)

Math Team

Math Team's purpose is to build a community around enjoying math. At some meetings, members of the team will give lectures about topics not usually encountered in math classes, such as combinatorics or number theory, including practice problems for the audience. At other meetings, members will pose interesting and challenging problems, and the team will work collaboratively to solve these problems.

Many members of the Math Team participate in competitions, where the topics discussed at our meetings frequently appear. Math Team has participated in the following competitions:

Massachusetts Math Olympiad
New England Math League
The American Mathematics Competition series
Purple Comet
The Harvard-MIT Math Tournament
Greater Boston Math League
The Mandelbrot Competition

Model Congress

Model UN

Commonwealth's Model UN team has attended the Brown University Simulation of the United Nations, MIT Model United Nations Conference, Boston College High School Model United Nations, and Concord Academy Model United Nations. Over the years, Commonwealth students have won many awards at these conferences, including Best Delegate, Outstanding Delegate (second place on the committee), and Best Position Paper.

Newspaper (Commonwealth Chronicle)

The Piracy Association of the Commonwealth

Inspired by the rivalry between the Fencing and Sailing teams, The Piracy Association of the Commonwealth (aka Pirate Club) was created to unite the would-be adversaries under one banner: piracy. Why argue about whose sport is better when you can have fun in the spirit of both?

Since its inception, Pirate Club has been meeting occasionally on Thursdays. The club hosted a Dress Like A Pirate Day the week before Halloween and had a crossover with GSA in a meeting on the queer history of pirates.

Our goal as a somewhat ambiguous and uncommon organization is to learn about pirates from all over the world during The Golden Age of Piracy (as well as possible other time periods... if they have boats and swords we're open to it). Come join us and our crew!

Politics Club

Commonwealth's Politics Club meets weekly to discuss breaking news and a wide variety of topics, including foreign policy, legislation, environmentalism, elections, and more. Students are welcome to stop by and talk in a group about different issues, and they are encouraged to learn from one another's beliefs and experiences throughout the course of the school year. The club also hosts watch parties for important events, like debates and election/poll coverage.

Rather than a structured or prepared debate club or one that competes in events, Politics Club is aimed at open discussion, where students listen and consider each other's thinking logically, discovering different perspectives on topics that are often siloed, especially in a world filled with an abundance of both resources and misinformation.

Quiz Bowl

Robotics Team

The Robotics Team is a venue for students to explore computer science, engineering, and applied physics through hands-on activities with electrical and mechanical systems. Students of all grades and experience levels are welcome and can participate in various ways.

Students can learn about standard microcontrollers with open-source programming and explore various topics including mechanics, electric circuits, and computer programming. The Robotics team has also participated in the inter-school VEX Robotics competition. The focus here is on a larger-scale robot that must perform per-determined functions with a given set of components. In both cases, students work as a team to design and build their ideas from scratch.

Speech Team

Yearbook

Commonwealth's annual yearbook is put together by a small but dedicated staff headed by an editor, a senior who, most often, was the previous year's assistant editor.

Commonwealth's yearbook differs from larger schools' in several ways. Though every student receives a yearbook, each senior has a full page, and creativity is encouraged. The book itself preserves the fun, offbeat feel of the School itself, rather than hewing to a predetermined format.

Designed to encourage interactions among people with a shared identity, each affinity group is student-initiated and set up through the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion. These collective efforts encourage friendship as students discover others who can relate to their experiences. Such bonds positively impact academic resilience and achievement, as well as general health and wellness.

Affinity and Alliance Groups

Asian Pacific Peoples Affinity Group (APPA)

Fempower

FLIC Group

Gender-Sexuality Alliance

Latino-Hispanic Association

oy. (Jewish Affinity Group)

Sisters Affinity Group

Social Events and Other Activities

When you start at Commonwealth, you’re welcomed into a tight group. Our school feels like a cross between a small village and a large family. It’s diverse and interconnected, an ideal setting for self-expression, dialogue, and banter. The camaraderie that flourishes in our classrooms naturally spills into day-to-day life. Simply put, our students enjoy each other's company, and they are keen to connect during dances (we have a penchant for mixing pop hits with funkier, deeper cuts), study groups, international adventures, or just at the end of the day, curled up on one of the couches in our beloved Dartmouth Lobby. Our COMMunity student group plans other fun school-year events like Valentine's Day treats, movie nights, and trivia.

I remember coming to Admitted Students’ Day, and all of the Commonwealth students knew each other so well. It seemed like the kind of place where everyone knows each other. And I thought, 'That is really cool.' It ended up being true. It's definitely a really accepting place. I didn't know if an institution with a larger body of people could just be so accepting and open. Everyone here is very close. You could do anything and be anyone, and people will still love you for you. Rihanna '24