Lola Karimi ’24
EE Co-Managing Editor
Our annual Student Council Spring Spirit Week kicks off next week and culminates Friday with our Spring Pep Rally. Check back soon to find out how you can participate in the pep rally!!
Here are the themes for our spirit week beginning Monday, April 22-26.
Mismatch Monday
Wear mismatched clothes/wacky patterns, etc.
Two for Tuesday
Twin day- pair up with a friend, classmate, or teacher and dress alike for the day
Wayback Wednesday
Decades day- dress like any decade
Sponsor a Teacher day- Thursday
Donate money for a great cause and get your teacher to dress up
Black and Gold Friday
Black and gold everything for the pep rally
Why do we do Spirit Week?
Learners that possess school spirit go beyond simply endorsing their institution. Compared to their less motivated classmates, they outperform them academically, engage in more social and civic activities, and generally have higher levels of happiness. Furthermore, 92% of principals believe that high student accomplishment and school spirit are related.
School-based sports in the United States are not like any other level of competition. Club sports and youth leagues can have high admission costs, and the emphasis is frequently on competitive performance rather than skill improvement, teamwork, or sportsmanship. Issues with media contracts, NIL, and the transfer portal have caused disruptions to high-profile college sports, and campuses throughout the nation are reminiscent of the “Wild West.”
Of course, the goals of professional sports are supreme skill, thrilling competition, and championship victories. Instead, in the 19,800+ high schools around the country, sports are much more about learning, building relationships, teamwork, having fun, and school spirit. Perhaps the most distinguishing feature between interscholastic and other levels of sports is school spirit: taking pride in one’s school, preserving a lifelong relationship with the school and its coaches, supporting all school teams and programs as a supporter or participant, and strengthening the link between the school and the community.
Self-confidence is a fundamental element of school spirit. Engaged athletes have a sense of pride in their teams and school, which they typically take with them into their post-high school jobs. Additionally, high school athletics have the power to strengthen community bonds. Every year, there are innumerable instances of this kind of community, but one particular instance was Fertile, Minnesota, a tiny hamlet situated roughly 270 miles northwest of Minneapolis. Jude Olson, a junior on the nine-player football team at Fertile-Beltrami High School, was killed in an accident in 2021 that shocked the town’s roughly 1,000 citizens.
However, the undefeated regular season and the team’s first-ever trip to the Minnesota State High School League Nine-player State Football Championship at U.S. Bank Stadium in Minneapolis last year gave the Fertile-Beltrami football team a significant boost to the town. Many people in the area lacked the resources to travel the five hours to the game, according to an article in the Grand Forks (North Dakota) Herald. To ensure that every fan who want to travel had a free ride to the game, local companies and farmers contributed $25,000 for five charter buses.
Fertile Oil Company co-owner Jodie Strem remarked, “It means a lot to the whole town. “We want (the players) to look in the stands and see us and know we are there for them. We are coming down full force.” Even though LeRoy-Ostrander defeated the Fertile-Beltrami Falcons in the MSHSL Nine-player Championship, the participants and the 274 spectators who traveled there will cherish much more than the result of the contest. This is the fundamental difference between high school sports and school spirit.
Activity programs in high school improve the morale of members of teams, communities, and individuals. Studies revealed that students’ mental health was severely harmed when these programs were closed because of the pandemic in 2020. In the post-pandemic world, in-person interactions are declining. Activities in high school have been a big factor in reuniting people. We are aware that communities support and attend school more frequently when there is a strong sense of school spirit. Sportsmanship and school spirit go hand in hand. Positive fan experiences can be achieved if school administrators communicate and uphold the expectations for fair sportsmanship and channel school spirit in that direction.
So dress up and have some fun!!
P.S. You’re never to cool for school.
Photo Credit: Scene from the 2023 Spring Pep Rally courtesy Mr. Miller (Trillium Yearbook)