Senior of the Week: Alaysha Zhang
By ERIN HAN, WILLIAM INOUE, and FORREST ZENG
It’s a cold Friday evening, but a small cluster of students walks along the icy paths, bustling with laughter and conversation. They have been walking for nearly an hour, talking about academics, life, and clubs. These hour-long walks that snake from one end of the Exeter campus to another are not a rare occurrence — after all, in senior Alaysha Zhang’s mind, walks are one of the most underappreciated methods of spending time with friends. Sporting a black puffer jacket, Zhang walks ahead with her arms linked with those of her friends, while the laughter and conversation flow freely.
Co-editor-in-chief of Pendulum, co-head of the Chinese Student Organization (CSO), and co-chair of the Student Council’s Tech Committee, Zhang spent part of her childhood in China, before moving to Los Angeles, CA. She is a student listener in Amen Hall and a runner for the girls varsity track team. Previously, Zhang was a Life Editor for The Exonian and was also involved in the Exie Blog. She enjoys playing card games with her friends and graphic design.
Zhang first arrived at Exeter as a prep in September 2020, when the Academy was conducting classes entirely online. That made initially for a difficult transition.
“All our classes started off as Zoom classes,” Zhang described. “For me, that was a pretty tough transition. When I first came here, and we were doing online classes in our dorms, I’d basically just stay inside most of the time and not go outside to do those prep activities that I should’ve been doing.” She added, “But I think things have changed a lot since.”
Over the years, Zhang has become involved in various clubs, including Pendulum, Exeter’s literary art magazine. At the moment, she is an editor-in-chief for Pendulum.
Senior and fellow editor-in-chief Hope Gantt described how Zhang first became involved as a lower. “Alaysha and I met each other through mutual friends our lower year, and we’ve worked together in Pendulum ever since,” Gantt said. “We plan meetings and design our annual publication together. She works hard to spread awareness about writing and art, especially because they’re often overlooked subjects at Exeter.”
Senior and co-editor-in-chief Lauren Kim commented on Zhang’s dedication to the club. “Especially with Pendulum, she’s been very dedicated. She’s always the most proactive one in our meetings.”
Friends commented on Zhang’s passion towards writing as her art form. “She likes sharing her knowledge through the form of writing, whether it be literary writing, poetry or other forms of creative writing. She really knows how to share her voice through writing and expressing that on paper,” close friend and senior Catherine Wu said.
Describing the experience of reading Zhang’s senior meditation, she continued. “I remember reading her meditation, and it was this really well-written piece about what she thought love was, and the different forms of love and relationships in her life. I thought it was one of the best pieces of writing I had read before, and it was a great way to get to know things I didn’t know about her before and get to know her on a deeper level.”
Senior Eric Wu similarly remarked, “I know she is a passionate writer and appreciator of art. It’s clear that she loves life and has a hopeful outlook.”
Zhang’s drive and kindness carry into her position as co-head of the Student Council Tech Committee. Upper and fellow committee co-head Eric Li said, “Alaysha is a very accommodating person. There were moments when I couldn’t fulfill a deadline and she would fill me in. She’s very forgiving, she’s very kind and she’s a wonderful person to work with.”
In the committee, Zhang manages graphic design for committee projects. “She designs the website’s visuals and form,” Li said. “I make her design come true as a program.”
In addition, Zhang serves as a co-head of the Chinese Student Organization (CSO), where she works to foster an inclusive affinity space, and is also greatly involved with the planning processes of club-held events.
As a fellow co-head, E. Wu described her work, “Alaysha is a great communicator in CSO. She has been prolific with talking with advisors and bridging the gap between club members and leadership.”
He posed an example where Zhang’s collaboration and hard work were apparent, “For our Chinese New Year celebration, to walk in the room and see everything come together — in part because of Alaysha’s incredible coordination — was extremely gratifying and meaningful.”
Zhang is a student listener in Amen Hall and loves connecting with her friends in the dorm. C. Wu, a close friend and dormmate said, “We’d hang out and spend a lot of time in the dorms with each other. Sometimes we would sit in the hallways, in the common room, since we were living on the same floor.”
Upper Freddie Chang highlighted a specific activity that Zhang enjoys in her dorm. “Alaysha and her friends play ‘Bridge,’ a kind of card game, a lot in their rooms,” Chang said. “They do that every night, and it requires a lot of good teamwork skills.”
In addition, her close friends lauded Zhang’s second-hand nature to express her deep care and support for her friends. C. Wu shared, “I really feel that she cares deeply about the people around her and wants the best for the people around her, and will do many things to make sure her friends know that she’s supporting them.” She continued, “Whether it’s by going to their sports games, getting them food when she goes to town, buying them random things from Grill, or bringing crazy jokes to the dinner table whenever we’re all together. In all these different ways, I feel like she [expresses how much she] really, really cares about the people around her.”
In addition to routine walks or baking sessions in the Amen Hall kitchen, Zhang enjoys the time she spends with her friends in her day-to-day also. “Sometimes I follow my friends into the music building and they practice. I’m not a very good musician, but a lot of my friends are and I always think it’s nice to have that in the background,” she said.
Zhang has made a lasting mark on the Exeter community with her warm presence. Gantt described, “Alaysha brings a lot of joy to the Exeter community. You can hear her laugh from across the dining hall and she’s always the first to smile and wave when you pass her on the path.”
She continued, “I admire Alaysha’s ability to see the best in people. Even if she doesn’t know someone well, she always has something kind to say about them. She’s pretty sentimental, but it means that she cares, a lot, and values the little things.”
Close friend and senior Sadie Shang echoed, “She’s caring, and she’s really good at communicating. She just [has this ability] to make everybody around her feel comfortable.”
Shang and others also recognized Zhang’s spirit of perseverance. Senior and friend Harrison McGovern shared, “[Something] I admire about Alaysha is her perseverance, and how she never seems to give up.”
McGovern mentioned the notoriously early meeting time for Pendulum, “There was a moment when I was about to go to Pendulum, but then I realized it would be at 10 a.m. on a Sunday, and no one would go to a club meeting at 10 a.m. on a Sunday.”
Shang added, “She’s there for every meeting so she wakes up at around nine every Sunday. That’s impressive.”
Close friends also shared that there never was a dull moment when spending time with Zhang. “She’s really just an interesting person to be around with,” shared Shang. “She’s never boring.”
E. Wu agreed, “We say that people could be high maintenance or low maintenance. I think she’s the maintainer. She is always there for people, and always exudes a positive and fun energy that can really brighten up any room she is in.” He added, “She always thinks of whimsical games and spontaneous ideas that are truly unique.” He proceeded to offer some examples, “Nobody else has ever asked me to griddy all the way to Stillwell’s or try to speak to each other with noise-canceling headphones on.”
C. Wu also described Zhang, “I think she’s very kind and soft, but also bubbly and cheerful — and also kind of a weird person. Weird in a good way though. She makes super weird jokes and will make weird faces or weird gestures, but it’s all in a funny way. Whenever I talk to her, she never fails to do something or say something that makes me laugh and it just really adds a bit of joy or spark to my life every day, which I admire about her.”
Zhang and her close friends agreed that over her four years at Exeter, she has grown in different ways from her prep self, into the person she is today. “As a prep and lower, I was more on the shyer side,” Zhang remarked. “Now, looking back, I’ve established so many more connections, and I sort of wish I did that earlier.”
Zhang continued, reflecting on the diverse aspects of her growth at Exeter, “I think…[I’ve grown] in terms of being more confident in myself and my place here at Exeter…But besides that, I think there’s another aspect of self confidence that [I have developed, regarding both my personality and relationships with friends.] I think that I’m a very emotional and sentimental person in general, more so than some of my friends who are more logical people, and I think that shows in many different ways. I used to always be scared that, if I showed my friends that I cared about them a lot, they might not reciprocate.”
She continued, “But I think that now, I’ve gotten to a place where I’m comfortable because I’m sure about my relationship with my friends, and our friendship is established enough to a point where that day-to-day reciprocation doesn’t matter, and it’s not a thing you keep track of.” Zhang shared that she believes this aspect has touched the other angles of her growth. “I feel like I’m more comfortable in doing what I want to, and expressing myself how I want to, because I’m also confident in my relationship with [my close friends]. That’s something that I’m pretty proud of.”
C. Wu echoed, “She’s very different than she was the way when I first met her in her lower year. I think she’s grown to be more independent and mature, and definitely more determined.”
She concluded, “Alaysha is someone who I look at and just wanna smile or laugh and be like, ‘Oh my God, she’s doing it again. She’s being Alaysha again and she’s just being herself — her usual funny self.’”
