Ram Fam has been a popular tag on social media, something said in the halls or at sporting events, and even made its way onto a few t-shirts.
But now it has become a way for parents and student to get together and serve the Highland community.
“The five values of Ram Fam are connecting with others, moving your body, eating healthy foods, caring and serving for others, and doing your best,” Kristen Southwick, a parent in the Highland community, said.
The group has 12 seniors who work with four adults from the community, all with one simple goal: to unite the students with the community of Highland.
To achieve this, Ram Fam has focused on events to bring people together.
“We do a spirit week, each day had a theme, day one was eat healthy, day two was stay fit, day three was act of kindness, day four was speaker day, and a big luau held at Fairmount.” Ben Bauman said.
By bringing everyone together, they held the spirit week to get people engaged. With daily events, it captures everyone in participating. Especially when there’s a motivation every day, students feel the need to focus more on themselves.
Along with spirit week, they also do a speaker series. With speakers coming in to communicate to the students, it’s one way Ram Fam unifies Highland.
They talk about the importance of education and how it’s shifted their lives. But mainly they focus on the values of Ram Fam.
To start with they had Congressman Ben McAdams come to talk about empathy and his work in helping to alleviate homelessness in Salt Lake City. Next, they had Jim Olson, the president of the Utah Jazz, who spoke about doing your best and striving for excellence.
And more recently they had the Reverend France Davis, a civil rights leader in Utah come and speak about our rights and why it’s important to know what you stand for.
All these speakers have been greeted by many students at Highland. This speaker’s series has brought the majority of students to observe. All these positive stories and impacts had the hope to uplift the students and get them motivated for the future.
The students that voluntarily joined Ram Fam also grew skills of their own.
“I think it’s helped me become a better planner, like we have to plan a lot of student led activities.” Lucy Munns said.
Lucy is a member of Ram Fam and enjoys the connection she creates with everyone. Ram Fam is a place that brings students together and creates the feeling of unity.
There are many leadership opportunities in Ram Fam and it’s a pathway for students to serve their community.
“I think we have a very good environment; it makes it very easy to connect and make friends.” Another member of Ram Fam, Amina Yarrow said.
The main environment they want to bring to highland is one easily to connect with. When they hold activities and speakers, they want everyone to feel welcome. When they advertise speakers or activities it’s an open opportunity for everyone.
“I think our school is really diverse, there’s a lot of people with different backgrounds, so I think if we can get everyone involved doing the same thing, it can create a unity in developing friendships.” Ben Bauman said.
Ram Fam cares about getting all backgrounds together to share unity. With everyone participating it’ll hopefully keep Ram Fam alive.
Because Ram Fam is new to Highland, no one is sure if it is able to last years and years. But they hope it’ll stay around a little longer.
“It is new to Highland this year and so getting the program known to the student body is the first step. The SBOs have really enjoyed having Ram Fam and want to help keep it going.” Eli Corrales another member of Ram Fam said.
For the future of Ram Fam Eli hopes that it will last for years. Especially if more people participate it can become a bigger asset to the highland.
There are lots of diverse backgrounds at Highland, and Ram Fam wants to use that for leverage. It’s important to Ram Fam to hold a unity for our school and give Highland reasons to take pride in being a Ram. So, the question is, will you participate?
