Ukulele Club: joy through music
By Ashley Shah
Seventh grader Jacob Zhu has been spreading joy through music at Thurgood Marshall Middle School (MMS). He started the Ukulele Club when he entered sixth grade at the school.
“Our fifth grade teacher, Mr. Garner Saguil at Dingeman Elementary School, taught ukulele as a part of the curriculum. He started incorporating music into his curriculum after COVID,” Zhu said. “He is really into theatre and music.”
The students were practicing ukulele around two to four times a week in the classroom.
“I wanted to carry-on playing ukulele in middle school. I wanted to be able to bring that joy into our school,” Zhu said.
Now, the club at the middle school has around 25 registered participants.
“We have 25 members that are enrolled in our Google Classroom, but around 20 members show up each week to our meetings,” he said.
Students are expected to bring their own ukulele. However, all music lovers are welcome.
The club meets once a week on Tuesdays during their lunch period in Ms. Jean Chalupsky’s room.
“We like to play songs from all sorts of genres and decades. We will practice a specific song for
about a month. We practice at lunch meetings and at home. We will play the song and record it at one of our lunch meetings,” Zhu said. “You don’t have to have a ukulele to be in the club. We have some people that just come to sing with us or to eat lunch with us.”
The videos that the students record are posted to the Google Classroom, so that other members and families of the students can see.
“They have a lot of goofy, fun moments together. A lot of the parents will see the videos and say that it makes them so happy to see the students having fun together and enjoying the music,” mom Elly Young said.
As more students join the club, Zhu is hoping to make a positive impact on communities in need.
“I wanted to do a fundraiser to help with the LA wildfires. It’s been hard trying to get in contact with a local business to help support us playing outside of their place as a way to raise money, but we have some other ideas,” Zhu said. “We are thinking of recording videos of ourselves playing and uploading them to GoFundMe.com as a way to raise money for organizations like the American Red Cross.”
Last summer, the club collaborated with members from Charity Harmony, an organization of musicians who strive to help homeless animals, at the Poway Farmer’s Market to raise money for the Helen Woodward Animal Center.
“They were just playing music, singing and having fun to help raise money for the animal center. A lot of people would stop by just to listen and enjoy the music. You could see the smiles on everyone’s faces,” Young said.
They raised more than $300.
Any student at MMS is able to join the club by showing up to any meeting.
“We just have a lot of fun every week. The videos have been my favorite part because everyone enjoys them and ends up smiling. Sometimes we even send the videos back to Mr. Saguil, which is really nice to be able to do,” Zhu said. “We can’t wait for more people to join our club.”