On March 12th 2026, the official Irvington High School Club Hunger Games began. A total of 70 clubs in the school had met for a 4 hour long battle royale that took place on school grounds. With 2 randomly chosen representatives from each club to defend the club with their life. The only major rule for the contestants is a limitation that only tools or “weapons” that are from their own club room may be used (e.g. painting knives from the art room are accepted). This event was suggested by the Fremont Unified School District Board of Finance, after many high schools reported big budget cuts to the clubs on campus. and became officially confirmed after many rounds of debate at teacher meetings.
While the event first sparked major backlash because of the inevitable violence, many clubs have been in full support of the event. “I think this would be a great chance for students to prove their dedication to their clubs”, said Ekuit E. (11), a student currently running for principal. “Winning the games for their club would surely be a good thing to put on their college applications”.
On the day of the event, the two student representatives for each club were told to stay inside assigned classrooms before the game started. After the sound of the bell, many clubs decided to take out their neighboring classrooms first. It didn’t take long until half of the participants were either injured or killed in the bloodbath.
There were 8 clubs with strategies that were particularly successful in eliminating the competition amidst the first hour. A major highlight would be the Irvington Research club’s plan of feigning a truce with other clubs. “At that time, we thought of ways to discreetly eliminate people so we wouldn’t seem like much of a threat.” Contestant Bendan Wang (12) explained, “My partner and I decided we should offer the other clubs some bottled water laced with formaldehyde and see if they’re stupid, well, unintelligent enough to drink it. I guess they were.”
For many of the clubs, it was after the third hour that their strategies began to fall apart. DECA, one of the most prominent clubs in the school, had members that started an infighting in order to claim the glory for themselves. “I mean, we had some weapons, so they weren’t hard to get rid of.” commented Ajnaabi Das (11) of the Road Biking Club. “It definitely didn’t help that one of them even pushed their partner towards us as a diversion away from themselves.”
However, there was one particular club that made a very interesting choice of blockading the door and staying inside the entire time. “We thought that it would be possible to wait the violence out.” said Avery Sung (10), a member of the BringChange2Mind Club. “Turns out that strategy was very successful.”
With their successes, the winning clubs look forward to continuing club activities throughout the year. In particular, the representative for the Culinary Club, Dazhang Lang (12) said, “It is really a great honor to have won. I also want to take the opportunity to announce our new cookie making event next Tuesday. I hope people come and celebrate our victory.”
