Homecoming themes often recirculate, but this year’s planning team threw something new into the mix: salad week. The idea began with lettuce and evolved into something more concrete as a group comprised of roughly two dozen students and Student Council (StuCo) members tossed around ideas in a studies room on Sept. 6.
The spirit week tagline is “we be dressing,” and every day will feature a different salad dressing. What’s more, a non-StuCo member came up with the original idea for the theme.
Unlike previous years, StuCo invited non-members to participate in the planning process for homecoming. StuCo adviser Kelley Wittenborn said the goal is to shift the focus to reflect more of the student body.
“Basically, the conversation evolved in that StuCo is a small group of students elected to represent the whole,” Wittenborn said, “but a lot of times the choices that they make either don’t represent the whole, or they don’t communicate with the whole very well.”
In addition, Wittenborn said many StuCo members have older siblings who were also StuCo representatives, which causes similar ideas and approaches to recirculate. She said StuCo wanted to open homecoming to hear from different perspectives.
“We just thought it would be a great idea to open [homecoming] up for new ideas,” Wittenborn said, “for new people who want to participate and want to help and, hopefully, to establish this idea that it is the whole school’s homecoming.”
Junior Kaitlyn Doninelli, a non-StuCo member, attended the meeting because she said she wants the dance to be more exciting. In previous years, Doninelli said she and her friends did not feel motivated to go to the dance or did not stay for more than 30 minutes. She hopes this year will be different.
“I just want to see more people looking forward to [homecoming] and having a better time than everyone has during the previous years,” Doninelli said. “I wanna hear our dance is better than Hickman’s for once.”
StuCo Vice President senior Sadia Moumita acknowledged the existence of previous dance and other event-related complaints. She said many StuCo representatives participate in fall sports, which take some of the focus away from homecoming plans. However, Moumita said this is an opportunity for the student body to voice their ideas.
“Inevitably, after every big event like this, there are always complaints, but here’s kind of the chance for the student body to be actively making decisions about it or voicing their concerns to make sure that they have the dance that they want, too,” Moumita said, “and it’s also a chance for the dance and the entire week to be more reflective of the entire student body even beyond the elected people in Student Council.”
Although there will be no more big group meetings, Wittenborn said any extra hands would be greatly appreciated. She said students can join any of the five committees: dance, assembly, queens, activities and publicity.
The organization and tasks assigned to each committee remain similar to years past. Doninelli joined both the dance and assembly committees and said her jobs range from organizing the homecoming assembly, to locating a DJ and finding decorations, all while staying within a budget.
Wittenborn said even if some students are not interested or don’t have time to help out on a committee, she challenges every student to participate in at least one spirit day theme. She said high school can be difficult and overwhelming at times, especially for students enrolled in rigorous courses, working jobs and trying to balance extracurriculars. She said homecoming week is a time for students to release a little of their stress and build community.
Even if the homecoming opportunity does not garner as many students or accomplish as many goals as StuCo had hoped, Wittenborn said it serves as a message that StuCo is working toward being more inclusive and reflective of the student body.
“Obviously, I hope [the homecoming planning] is well received [but] even if it doesn’t work to the level that we want it to,” Wittenborn said, “hopefully it’s just a message to the school that Student Council really is trying to include the whole school in things that we do, trying to give back [and] make the school atmosphere fun and inclusive for every student.”
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