Where's Our School Spirit?

Just this past weekend, Exonians both past and present donned their Exeter gear and drew red stripes on their faces. EA was finally here, the day where Exeter and Andover play their varsity teams against each other. The stands were packed, half of which was red and the other half blue, screaming cheers at each other and the players. Red Bandits scurried around, screaming cheers at the crowd until their voices got hoarse, and the crowd responded, screaming cheers back as they shivered in their jackets. At least, that’s how it usually goes.

Everyone looks forward to EA as a time to unify with fellow Exonians against the Smurfs, and to get hyped. People make posters such as “Ken Bone wore red” or “Andover cites Wikipedia,” and some people literally paint their entire faces red. Getting excited for EA and cheering on classmates is a great way to de-stress, and to end your term on a high note. Sometimes, both sides get a bit too enthusiastic to the point where we are almost insulting each other: for instance, screaming “George Bush” while pointing at the Andover section. It can be cringe-worthy at times, but it’s also so fun to see people have a great time and get so pumped up. However, this year, red bandits struggled in getting everyone to stand and cheer. We were so quite, the Smurfs droned us out whenever we screamed cheers at each other.

It wasn’t as hyped up as EA usually is, and it made me sad. I understand that everyone is exhausted at this point in the year; as an Upper, I especially understand the bone-deep tiredness everyone is feeling. But in the past, everyone rose to their feet without being asked to do so to scream their heads off, despite being almost delirious with exhaustion. The enthusiasm electrified the air, makes us forget how tired we are. And what can we do to always be hyped?

Andover always gets super hyped up before EA. Their version of red bandits, called blue key heads, are integrated into their daily lives at Andover, and don’t simply serve as cheerleaders for only EA. They’re pretty serious about school spirit: they have try-outs, so to speak, where they have to make their own cheers and yell them in a public space. The ones who are the most spirited and enthusiastic become blue key heads, and do all sorts of spirit-related things around campus. This includes welcoming new students to Andover: they stand outside the area where the cars of new students drive into the Andover campus, and cheer and wave, pumping up the new kids and alleviating the nervous butterflies in their stomachs. People go to them, because they’re known as happy and enthusiastic people: they’re like super excited proctors for the whole campus.

We should do something like that too! Our dorm pride at Exeter is so great: assemblies where people proudly scream their dorm names whenever someone from their dorm introduces themselves on stage can attest to that. But our school pride is not nearly as spectacular. Our goal as a school should be do put those two at the same level, and I think we can take some notes from Andover. Getting people excited to become a part of our community and hyped up for events, like the blue key heads do, would not only unify us more as a school, but also, I think, make us happier and more content to be at PEA. So then why don’t we make our spirit leaders a normal part of our lives here at Exeter, to increase our school pride?