After being revamped in February 2018 by Pinn Chirathivat ’19, Sophie Mars ’19, Tippa Chan ’19 and Carly Casazza ’19, the editors of the Humans of Choate Instagram account are prepared to pass down the club to a new group of individuals. An application is being put out to the student population to apply for these positions.
Humans of Choate provides the Choate community with a platform for sharing personal stories. Similar to Humans of New York, the photoblog is a collection of interviews and portraits of Choate students, teachers, and alumni. Stories presented by Humans of Choate highlight different topics that range from issues regarding race, socioeconomic status, and politics to more light-hearted stories about friendships and accomplishments. No one theme governs Humans of Choate, and each story has its own identity.
Humans of Choate aims to give a voice to individuals and groups at Choate and to spark meaningful conversations within the community. Chirathivat, Reporting Editor of the account, said, “Everyone has a story to share, and I think that it is important that people’s voices are heard.” Humans of Choate has covered many different members of the Choate community, covering faculty, alumni and current students. The stories range from faculty love stories to alumni reminiscing about Choate moments.
This variety is one reason the club is drawing so much interest from younger students who are applying for editorship. Applicant Sasha Pavlik ’21 said, “I feel like it is one of the most important publications. The stories are so impactful and are so truthful that they reach a deeper and empathetic side of the student body.”
Originally, Humans of Choate was a part of the Photography Club. As the president of Photography Club, Chirathivat realized that Humans of Choate had a different mission from that of Photography Club and decided to make Humans of Choate into a separate club. Chirathivat said, “It all started at the KEC. I remember talking to an amazing group of friends during lunch about Humans of Choate, and we decided to work together to make it happen.” Those friends being Mars, Chan, and Casazza.
The current editors all have different interests and passions, bringing a diverse range of skills and ideas to the club. Mars explained, “We all have different strengths, and that’s what makes us work so well together.” She continued, “That is why we decided to have two applications. This is a process that goes in multiple steps because it’s such a deep club.” This wide range of interests in the cabinet has led to a wide variety of coverage from Humans of Choate, detailing stories of friendships, relationships and the background of students before they arrived at Choate. For example, Humans of Choate released a Valentine Day series, covering three different couples and the stories of how they met.
However, the club also focuses on heavier stories from members of the community. Recently, the club released a series of posts that detailed a heart-wrenching story on the internal family struggles of an anonymous Choate student. The post received an outpouring of support in the comments, showing the importance of sharing stories from our community, no matter the weight of the topic.
With this in mind, current Humans of Choate editors value the importance of having different strengths and weaknesses. They are looking to build a strong team that will fill their positions after they graduate. Furthermore, in order to maintain the quality of this photoblog, Humans of Choate has decided to keep the club small, appointing only four editors. However, Casazza said, “Things might change in the future, but I hope that our successors will continue what we did and share incredible stories of our Choate community.”
