From streamers and psych cards decorating Main Building to festive costumes on students, Spirit Week transformed the school. Starting on Monday, November 6, and culminating in Taft Day, Saturday, November 11, Spirit Week encouraged the community to show school pride. This year’s festivities received several major updates, as administrators and students worked together to implement improvements.
Blue and White, the school’s spirit club, worked with All-School Presidents Anji Ashaye ’24 and Jacquo Pierre ’24 to make changes to this year’s Spirit Week, hoping to breathe fresh air into the celebrations. Students decorated Main Buildling with streamers, balloons, psych cards, and large cutouts of Fall Varsity and Junior Varsity captains. Francesca Farman-Farmaian ’24, co-head of Blue & White, said, “One big thing that we emphasized this year was positive leadership by the upperclass students, which really helps underclass students understand the concept of school spirit and generates a lot of positive energy.”
At this year’s pep rally, which took place in Fowle Gym on November 8, the community enjoyed a long performance with more diverse acts. Team dance routines involved not just Varsity athletes, as in past years, but members of the crowd and faculty as well. It also included a theater performance and a choreographed “step battle” from the Step Team.
In the class days leading up to Taft Day, student leaders traditionally choose a different dress-up theme for each day. This year, many of the themes were updated–“preppy day” became “country versus country club day,” “dress like a Taftie day” was replaced with “jersey day,” and “Wayback Wednesday” became “Throwback Thursday.” Team costumes for Throwback Thursday included pioneers, dinosaurs, cavepeople, gladiators, and clothes from the 90s.
Farman-Farmaian said, “Another thing we’ve tried to do is to have more Spirit messaging in All-Schools leading up to this week; we’ve tried to spread it out and let it build a little bit more. I think we’re getting really positive feedback, where people are really excited about merch, and really showed up at the Rhino building, which looks so good. Things like that help people have that extra boost of school pride, which has been really awesome this week.”
On Taft Day, students watched peers compete in athletic contests while enjoying concessions including sliders, french fries, hot apple cider, and freshly made donuts. The Blue Mob, a group of students led by Blue and White, traveled from game to game cheering and playing music. Ms. Marcie Wistar, director of student activities, said, “On Taft Day, it’s fun to travel with the [Blue Mob] because you’re surrounded by people that are having a good time and being supportive of the school.”
