The week of homecoming provides students with an opportunity to showcase their spirit through various activities and events, such as the hall decorations and spirit dress days. Since 1997, the presentation of the homecoming video has been paramount to the spirit at WJ. Although the writing of the video script relied mostly on the SGA officers, more people were involved this year.
“It was a really big effort and we had a lot of the senior class officers help us out, so it’s been a lot more of a group effort,” said SGA President Jake Karlin.
The homecoming video typically serves as a source of humor for the student body, and the SGA officers have been working for the past few months to create their feature film.
They started planning after they were elected in June 2011, and worked over the summer to create the script. According to the officers, getting the script approved and finalized has been the most laborious task so far. After the script is written, it goes through a tedious editing process. Apart from SGA Advisor Nico Atencio, Assistant Principal Chris Merrill and Principal Jennifer Baker are also given the script to review.
“Just going purely off the script …it’s a great movie,” said SGA Vice President Josh Brenits. “[Since] we’re a pretty diverse SGA, we have a lot of different jokes that will appeal to a bunch of different people. It’s not just inside jokes that only one group will enjoy.”
Though incoming freshmen may not be aware of the WJ tradition, the other grades, particularly the seniors, know what to anticipate.
“If they don’t love it, [the students will] probably just hate us,” said Karlin.
Homecoming videos of recent years have reflected blockbusters such as “Harry Potter and The Sorcerer’s Stone,” “The Dark Knight” and “The Hangover.” This year’s SGA plans to keep the trend going.
“[This year’s homecoming video is] kind of a skeleton of ‘Hot Tub Time Machine,’” said SGA Treasurer Santi De Paco, in reference to the 2010 comedy film.
Though they did offer The Pitch some sneak peeks, including a surprise appearance and an abundance of funny jokes, the SGA remains tight-lipped regarding any large spoilers or surprises.
“They wouldn’t be surprises if we told you,” said SGA Secretary Takunda Ndoro.
So WJ, get ready for some hot-tubbing homecoming madness coming your way on Oct. 20 during third period. Look out for the Wildcat, some loud ringing noises, a fruit basket and perhaps some Gingers, too.
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