I remember my first spirit week at Palmer in grade 8. I was incredibly excited, partly because I thought that it would be fun because everybody would be doing it, and partly because it was my first year of high school, so I was very keen on doing many school sanctioned events. I did every theme that week, yet I noticed that little people did the same. Since then, I have noticed that less and less people partake in these weeks wholeheartedly as the special weeks go by.
Currently, I do not actively participate in spirit weeks. However, this does not mean that I don't have school spirit, or that I don't love this school. (I am actually currently fighting with everything that I have and every part of my heart and soul to be able to stay here for the remainder of high school, but that is a another story). I just dislike how they create boundaries about how I show my school spirit. All the days have themes, so if I do not follow the theme of the day per say, then it implies that I don't have school spirit. The boundaries, to me, say, "Do you have spirit? If you do, we have decided that this is how you should show it. Hopefully, everybody does all the days because that's what people with school spirit would do!", and I hate limits on basically anything to do with expressing myself. Furthermore, I find it odd that if we actually do have school spirit, the way to specifically show it is in a spirit week with dressing up to a certain predetermined theme by student council on a day in a week instead of being able to express our school spirit in any creative way that we want. Part of what makes us have school spirit is the fact that we are all different types of people connecting harmoniously in one school. Because we are different types of people, we all have our own ways of expressing school spirit that we are more comfortable with individually than simply dressing up to a random theme, whether the expression be large or small. Also, most of the themes of the days are irrelevant to Palmer, so how does dressing up in a spirit week prove that we indeed do have school spirit? Does bringing a banana to school so we get to eat a free sundai during lunch subliminally send the message that we are proud griffins who love RC Palmer Secondary? Perhaps if the themes were more closely related to Palmer with a little more freedom, (with the exception of Blue and White Day), instead of random themes that don't have anything to do with Palmer, more people would participate because then, at least that would actually be showing spirit in ways related to our school. Plus, for the unmotivated people, it would be one less reason not to participate as well.
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Hm, I like what you said about boundaries and diversity and freedom of expression. I actually didn't think about that until I read this post, and I have to say, I completely agree with you.
ReplyDeleteIt's interesting isn't it? They created Spirit Week to bring people together, but instead it's driving people apart by setting up social standards are are completely irrelevant to practically anything.
ReplyDeleteOne comment though...if there are 1 out of 4 the weeks in a month that is a "special spirit" week, the special and the spirit part sounds just too ordinary.
ReplyDeleteCompare:
"1. we are in real trouble
2. we are in real trouble
3. we are in real trouble"
with:
"we are in trouble."
Either that made no sense at all, or I just have problems & no idea what you just said.
ReplyDeleteWhat do you mean by 1 of 4 weeks that's a special spirit week?
every school month there is a spirit week...
ReplyDeleteThat's not true. We haven't had one in January!
ReplyDeletereally?! I did not know that....
ReplyDeleteHe just doesn't really pay attention to what's going on, then he expresses feelings about things that haven't happened. Get used to it.
ReplyDeleteI swear to pancakes that I pay attention to stuff around me.
ReplyDeletePft. I'd stake my life on the fact that you don't.
ReplyDeleteYep, it is waffles now...
ReplyDeletePft. Barley isn't going to be happy with you and your random post. And I was saying that you don't pay attention, not denying the fact that you swear "to" pancakes. (should be swear by., by the way, not to)
ReplyDeleteBut honestly speaking, breakfast, being the first meal of the day, is rarely useful given the fact that I often lack the energy to do any work in the morning even after large consumption of calories. Heck, I proved that eating a Big Mac will decrease your mental capability by nearly 20%.
ReplyDeleteDid you hear me mention that Barley isn't going to be enthralled with you and your random post. I actually bothered to ask her if we could, because I'd like to make some unasked for posts myself, and she said she'd think about it. Meaning, we can't until she's made a decision about freelance posting. And breakfast is useful, it gets your metabolism up and running for the day. For someone who's one year ahead of the rest of us in science, you sure don't know much about biology at all.
ReplyDeleteFine, I eat breakfast now! But milk is still not a healthy choice form breakfast.
ReplyDeleteand that was for not form
ReplyDelete