Homecoming has always been a huge part of tradition at Liberty High School. Each year’s festivities include pep rallies, performances, parades, competitions, a football game, art and just a celebration of the new school year. But like most activities this school year, COVID-19 has put a damper on things.

Student body president, senior Grace Pickering is hoping for the student council to uphold some major traditions through the upcoming Spirit Week (9/21 – 9/25). 

“It’s definitely going to be a lot different from years before, but we’re just trying to be as creative as we can,” Pickering said. “We want to try to figure out ways that the school can come together, because we kind of need that.”

Dance (POSTPONED)- The Wentzville School District as a whole made the decision to postpone the Homecoming Dance itself to February 2021. This was in an effort to limit the amount of social gatherings that would allow for transmission of COVID-19. Although a big part of the normal Liberty festivities has been “cancelled” for now, the student council still plans to continue with tradition in other areas. Some of these activities include the chalk art contest, a virtual pep assembly, and of course, spirit days.

The theme for this Homecoming Spirit is “That 70’s Homecoming.” This decision was made based on the student council’s overall theme for the 2020-2021 theme: “Decades.” So this means peace signs, disco and retro patterns.

Spirit Days – To make both AA and BB students more unified, the spirit days this time around will be “mirrored.” Monday and Thursday will be the same theme, Tuesday and Friday will be the same theme, and Wednesday will be a completely virtual spirit day. See the flyer attached to get your spirit on.

“The days are simple enough for school-wide participation,” Ms. Holmes, student council adviser, said. “I’m hoping that we have more people stop by the spirit wall and to get their photo taken so we can feature more people on our Instagram.”

Replacing “Homecoming Court” & “Spirit Court” will be a new “Spirit Champs” competition. To enter: dress up each day, send your picture to the Student Council by 3 p.m. each day (@wsdlhsstuco), and vote on your AA & BB Spirit Champs. The winners will receive gift cards to QT.

Pep Assembly (VIRTUAL)- On Wednesday Sept. 23, students will be able to watch a pre-recorded version of the Homecoming Pep Assembly during their Academic Intervention. The 10-minute video will include student and staff games, announcements, and performances from our cheer, dance and band.

Hoco Parade (CANCELLED)- The annual Wentzville Homecoming Parade is an annual event that celebrates the three high schools as well as the rest of the district. Activities and clubs from all schools create floats and throw out candy to the crowd, all along the same route each year. Same as the dance, the parade has been cancelled. As a way to keep up tradition, there was an effort to hold a Liberty-specific parade the day of the game (Sept. 25). Unfortunately, due to logistical issues, this will not be possible.

Chalk Art- The chalk art contest is open to all clubs, activities, and fall sports. As always, each participating team will be assigned a square of concrete in the front of the school that they get to design. Chalk will be provided, but masks and social distancing is a must. The winning square will win a QT gift-card.

“I think that it was important for us to still put on something that resembled a homecoming week, because we are still back in school and we still need to celebrate that; even though that means socially distancing and not having a dance. It’s still cool to celebrate being back in the building after being gone for so long,” Holmes said.

In a year of uncertainty, let’s take a look behind the scenes of something never done at Liberty High School – a virtual pep assembly. Due to COVID-19, homecoming has been pushed back, but student council isn’t going to let that stop students from getting a homecoming week.

“It was quite different, and took me out of my comfort zone. Although I had a lot of fun and I am super excited to see how it turns out,” Stuco member Tess Roberts (11) said, who is one of the students running the assembly. 

The year-long theme “Decades” has led to the decision to make homecoming 70’s themed. So obviously the assembly has to match the theme of the 70s and the hosts tried their best to give the audience an enjoyable hippie experience.

This video was not the easiest thing to film, since it’s hard to bring out emotion and do everything in front of just a camera- with no actual audience.

“Aidan (Berry) and I had a lot of mess up’s and redo’s but once we started to get it down, we started to have fun with it,” stated Owen Herling another student council member that helped host the assembly.

Being able to adjust and make the best out of your situation is going to be the norm for students, all year long. And this is exactly what happened with the pep assembly.  

But just because the school physically can’t have an assembly, doesn’t mean there can’t be one. Students came together to film something that has never done before to give students across the school the best homecoming week possible. The assembly will be available to watch on Wednesday Sept. 23.