Since the beginning of the year, Adam Sandler Day has been a highly anticipated Spirit Week option, especially for senior class president, Ayla Ahmetovic.
Finally, during Go Orange week, Adam Sandler Day is scheduled to make an appearance on Thursday—along with Monday’s pajama day, Tuesday’s farmer day, Wednesday’s pink-out, and Friday’s orange-out. However, Ayla admits that deciding on Spirit Week activities isn’t always the most entertaining part of student council meetings.
“We usually sit in Stiles’ room after school, and then we’ll have a few spirit day ideas,” Ayla said. “Then, we’ll narrow it down and have people vote on it. I know, especially with Adam Sandler Day, we’ve been trying to get it from the beginning of the year, and it gets changed to Denim Day or Throwback Thursday. It’s just a terrible process because everyone just wants their option to be the spirit day, but at the end of the day, it’s just fun.”
Although spirit events only add to the entertainment, Go Orange Week has a much more involving objective. Student council members have been working to advertise the good cause this week is directed towards: Kids’ Food Basket. Food donations are being collected—Cheez-It’s from the freshmen and juniors and Goldfish from the sophomores and seniors—along with cash from the coin wars taking place at lunch. All of these proceeds will go towards raising resources for Kids’ Food Basket.
Even when students aren’t able to bring much in, Ayla reinforces the idea that every small donation, every penny, is counting towards a worthy cause.
“Everyone just putting in at least a little bit of effort really helps,” Ayla said. “One of the things that I think Mrs. Richardson said when it came to Family Promise was that instead of getting a six-dollar coffee the morning before school, save that six dollars and donate it. It’s just an easier way because you’re not necessarily losing money except the money you were going to spend on a beverage that will be gone in two hours.”
After witnessing the Family Promise donation week, it is evident that FHC can prove time and time again that the student body is capable of raising thousands of dollars once they put their mind to it. The advisor of the student council, Laura Stiles, has seen these numbers in prior years and plays a crucial role in overseeing every fundraiser the school participates in.
However, the most important aspect of Go Orange Week isn’t necessarily getting the highest number of donations, but spreading awareness of Kids’ Food Basket and its positive influence in our community. Advertisements on FX, posters throughout the school, and person-to-person communication via student council information all aid in increasing participation.
“I think the number one thing is to just raise awareness,” Stiles said, “but of course, any donations we can give is always super helpful too. Next year, we’re going to plan this out starting a lot sooner just so it’s on everybody’s radar, and it’s not a last-minute thing. This is why we’re not having an assembly because we wanted it to be a good assembly if we would have one.”
Not only is this increasing the understanding of Kids’ Food Basket, but it also creates a heightened sense of community inside and outside the school walls. FHC hasn’t always engaged in this fundraiser, but over the years of observing Northern and Eastern’s success in donations, the large student population has influenced adults in the school, like Stiles, to partake in the charitable event, creating a stronger sense of community across the district.
Vice president of the junior class, Keegan Redmond, emphasizes the importance of student council involvement and what their decision-making process looks like going into this event.
“A lot of this is that Northern and Eastern have done [Go Orange week] multiple years prior,” Keegan said. “We just jumped into it last year, so this is only our second year doing it. It’s a lot of decisions from Northern and Eastern, and we’re just trying to get a lot of the information out to make kind of minor decisions on ways to best raise food and money and get people more involved.”
Along with interest in spirit days, there are other entertaining activities for students to participate in throughout the week: on Wednesday, Northern is hosting a district-wide Quiz Bowl that raises even more money from each team that pays to compete; on Thursday, a three-on-three basketball game will take place at Northern as well; on Friday, students will play each other to win the most beaded necklaces in a battle of rock paper scissors with the entire school.
Due to the delay in dates—last year Go Orange happened a week earlier—the normal routine of organizing a dodgeball game was replaced with the prior events.
“We usually host dodgeball, but we couldn’t get a gym because of spring sports,” Stiles said. “I think last year we did this a week sooner, so no one was in the gyms. Now that spring sports have started, even though it’s nice weather out, we didn’t know. We planned to have the teams play inside if it was raining. So, we’re not hosting dodgeball this year, but Northern replaced it with three-on-three basketball.”
This week, as stressed by the student council, is nothing without contributions from the school. Food donations, coins, and simply bringing attention to the ongoing matter that Kids’ Food Basket wishes to eliminate, will continue to be supported by large participation in district-wide events.
Understanding this is only our second year doing Go Orange week, it’s still Keegan’s goal to normalize making this fundraiser bigger each year, and he believes that having an interest in it is key to more prosperous years in the future.
“Just be involved,” Keegan said, “and do the spirit days, decorate the bags, bring in your change, bring in food. This whole week is kind of what the student body makes it, so if we are more involved, then it’s going to be a bigger success.”
