Farewell Rally & Voyage Through Time Spirit Week
HEY ASB!
Spirit has just wrapped up the Voyage Through Time spirit week from 4/10-4/13, ending the week off with Farewell Rally on 4/14. We want to give another thank you to all of you for an amazing final rally of the year.
Spirit Week:
Here are the days in order:
Senioritis Monday - Therapy Animals (comment your best rec roast!!)
Seniolympics Tuesday - Seniolympics (POSTPONED)
Senior Citizen Wednesday - Letters to Seniors/Future Self
See-N-Your Future Thursday - College Rejection Board
We themed each of our spirit days around the word “senior” (with some of the names being better than others). The actual themes for dressing were similar to online trends as we have been attempting for the past few.
Points for Discussion:
Was making the spirit days senior themed worth it? It lead to a little bit of a roadblock for some creative spirit days due to the constraint of containing senior.
Are decs worth the trouble? As Farewell Rally is the final rally of the year and the sendoff for seniors, it’s in our best interest to make this rally extra special, but there were a lot of considerations with bringing all the decs back and forth for the last two days of the spirit week.
Due to the bomb threat, the Seniolympics lunchtime event had to be canceled. What could we do in the future to prepare in advance in case of an issue like this?
Should we continue doing daily recap reels for each spirit day?
What other ways can we promote the spirit week and make the week just feel more special? Any ideas to emphasize the importance of the Farewell Rally and transform the vibe of the school are welcome.
Should we have individual posts for each lunchtime event?
Rally Setup/Rehearsal
We had rally set up for 4-8PM on Thursday 4/13. All backdrops were made in front of the ASB Den. For balloons, freshmen and seniors worked in the gym lobby and the juniors and sophomores worked in the ASB Classroom.
Points for Discussion:
Should we allow more time or days for the rally setup?
Were there any mass inconveniences/confusion with either balloon or backdrop making? (We heard that some classes were very stressed out towards the end so feel free to talk about that)
How can we convince more people to come out to rally setup and participate? (there was very low turnout lolzlies)
Rally Day
To wrap up the week, we had our FAREWELL RALLY on 4/14. It took place in the gym during tutorial. As you all probably know, we really wanted to use slides to dive into the theme of a voyage and an adventure map. Some issues were encountered with timing during the rally, but we were able to end on time with a bit of improvisation. We ended up cutting the the final song of Crowd Song Game and our inspirational conclusion script.
Points for Discussion:
Any general feedback? What went well? What didn’t go well?
Any ideas on how to make farewell rally feel different from other rallies?
How can we speed up the process of bringing up volunteers?
How should we manage in case of technical difficulties? Our third mic was cutting out throughout the rally and we ended up using 2.
Was lunch cleanup worth it? It ended up being all broken down anyway and not many people came to take photos during lunch, which was a huge risk
Thank you for all your feedback :)))
- Spirit
Hey spirit!!
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely LOVED the farewell rally -- I think y'all did a great job including seniors and making this as memorable as possible for them! Personally, I thought that making the days themed towards seniors was worth it and dedicating a rally and week towards them makes it more memorable. For the future, in the case that something like the bomb threat arises, it would be nice to allocate/plan a backup date that is just a date that all groups are still able to participate in to decrease the hassle of finding a new date and going through the communication process an extra time. I personally liked the rally reels and I feel that it helps maintain and keep the spirit throughout the week and encourage students to continue dressing up as typically there's more participation towards the start of the week. In the future, I liked the idea of having senior tokens but maybe passing them out to seniors at the beginning of the week can start off the week in getting the entire school involved as seniors may give their tokens to underclassmen rather than just having it on the last day?
For more class-specific feedback -- I think it would be great for rallies next year to encourage CO teams to have balloons hanging to the side (one on the wall and another onto the string in the back) as this makes it easier for students to pass by and also allows for more seating/standing space. Officer teams can also consider working with each other (especially for farewell rally to go all out) and hanging objects across a string (make sure they're not too heavy) as I felt that it added a nice touch across the gym rather than just on both sides of the bleachers. And for gauntlet, pushing more PR about the freebies would probably help enourage more students to come out. YAY great job spirit!!
-- amy :)
Hi spirit,
ReplyDeleteGreat job on the farewell rally, there were so many fun and exciting events all packed into one week and I'm sure a lot of people really enjoyed it. As someone who helped with moving a lot of the decs, I think it was nice (particularly the backdrop), but in the future it might be easier if we take less decs. I think there was just so much and it requires multiple trips/cars for transportation and they are really big, so I think that it's not really worth the effort to take so many, and instead just take a few + the backdrop.
Also for gauntlet, to improve participation, I think there could've been more promotion just for the gauntlet, and I also think people were confused if the seniors were supposed to go or if it's underclassmen only. There were a few people who were asking me if seniors were supposed to attend or if it was going to be organized by underclassmen.
Otherwise, great job! You all worked really hard to make this spirit rally week really fun!
- Katie :)
hi spirit!!!!
ReplyDeletefarewell rally was SOSOSO much fun and i really loved how you guys decided to do lunchtime activities. it made the week a lot more special and i hope it happens in future years as well.
- i dont think the activities have to include "senior" in them if it limits the amount of things you guys can do. people will still be engaged if it is a part of spirit week. i loved the idea of college rejection board and i think you guys should continue to do that. as far as the bomb threat goes, i dont think you guys would have to plan for anything like that in upcoming years. however, if it does end up raining or the weather is bad we could try moving the event to the gym if it is not being used.
- for rally set up, we could start to incentivize people coming by offering lynbrook spirit points. if the classes have enough money in their budget, they could publicize to their classes that there will be food.
- for time management of rallies, i feel like you guys could plan the rally to be ~5 minutes shorter than it actually is so if you guys go overtime there wont be a need to cut out segments of the rally. i feel like people may not have come to take pictures with the backdrop and all at lunch because of the sprom fashion show. im not sure if those were coordinated to be on the same day but i think having them on different days would increase attendance for both events.
anyway, farewell rally is so fun and i love how it turned out. amazing job and i cant wait for next yea!!!!11!!!
-aarya <3
helloooo spiritttt!! farewell rally was superbly fantastic as usual. here are my responses!
ReplyDeletespirit week:
1. i think the senior themes were really funny and worked out great! i know people had an awesome time planning their outfits and making fun of the seniors
2. i really liked the tulle decor on the tall black lamps as it was super noticeable, but i dont think many people knew it was for farewell rally. i dont believe the decs are extremely vital to the event though, so skipping out on them should be ok.
3. i dont think you could ever predict something like this happening, so it would difficult to plan ahead. however, maybe meeting up the all those involved the week before to revise details AND set an "emergency" date in case the original one didn't work would be a good fallback. that way, you could immediately promote the new date after an event like this instead of having to communicate back and forth with all the athletes.
4. yes! i loved the daily recap reels! i think different people could be featured in them every round, instead of a single group being repeated for them all.
5. i agree that the promotion for this event could have been more extensive. we should definitely include teachers and ask them to promote to their class AND (just like for winter formal) visit all 4th-period classes the friday before the spirit week and talk about it (possibly pass out flyers with all the themes or present a QR code they can scan to an online flyer). most of the promo for this event was on instagram which was inconvienience for those who don't have it (and most teachers didn't know the themes either!!)
6. YES! the more promo the better honestly. especially for events like College Rejection Board - promoting it better would gather a larger audience and be more fun.
rally setup/rehearsal:
1/2. skipped
3. i feel like maple wrote this blogger with the "lolzies"....i do think there was a very low turnout this time and it wasn't very...vibey? usually rally setups give a late-night-hangout-with-friends-cozy-warm-so-fun-awesome vibe but i didn't get that from this rally. it was more rushed and there were definitely fewer people. i think promoting rally setup better to underclassmen and emphasizing that it was the LAST RALLY SETUP FOR THE WHOLE SCHOOL YEAR would be good.
rally day:
1. awesome awesome awesome. mics were a little funny again so maybe looking into them more extensively to prevent problems at future rallies? the slides were beautiful (@satvik) and everything flowed very smoothly. it was a little difficult for some students to understand what was going on during games, so possibly explaining the rules a bit more clearly?
2. seeeeniorsss - i think you all did an awesome wonderful fantastic job making this a heartfelt tearjerking rally and it really spotlights seniors (especially with redout)
3. if it works better, have a spirit commissioner pick class volunteers instead of COs because they know exactly when and how many to pick?
4. lolllllllll i think you did a great job working with it but we should definitely get that mic checked
5. YES! however, i think that we can modify it a bit and only allow seniors to clean up at lunch (and not other classes).
LOVE YOU SPRIITITSITS 😈😈
-shrey
hi spirit!
ReplyDeletei wanted to come on here and talk about the senior tokens, which i thought were a super cute idea, and i know a lot of people really appreciated them! one thing to note for the future though is that i think it could be valuable to give out the tokens at the start of the week so that students have the entire week to kind of think about who they want to give the token to and why (or a least a few days if you want to give them out later). passing the tokens out before school and before the rally went okay, but there was a bit too much hype for people to want to really listen to what the tokens were about and there was a bit of confusion when it came to what they were for. other than that, the tokens were really sweet, so just something to think about for the future!
sincerely,
allison h
Hello Spirit!
ReplyDeleteIt was a great week with Voyage Through Time spirit week and Farewell Rally. Here are some thoughts on the points for discussion you raised:
Spirit Week:
It's great that you were able to come up with creative spirit days that fit the senior theme, but it's understandable that it could be limiting. Consider expanding the themes for future spirit weeks to allow for more variety.
Decs can be a lot of work, but they can also add a lot to the atmosphere of the rally. Consider asking for more help or finding ways to streamline the process to make it more manageable.
It's always a good idea to have a backup plan in case of emergencies like the bomb threat that caused the cancellation of the Seniolympics lunchtime event. Consider having a few backup events planned that can be easily implemented if necessary.
Daily recap reels can be a great way to promote the spirit week and get students excited about participating.
Rally Setup/Rehearsal:
It might be worth considering allowing more time for rally setup to avoid stress and confusion.
Consider providing more guidance or support for classes during balloon or backdrop making to help alleviate stress and encourage participation.
To encourage more participation in rally setup, consider offering incentives or rewards for classes that have high turnout.
Rally Day:
Overall, it sounds like the rally went well despite some technical difficulties. Consider having backup plans in case of technical difficulties, such as extra microphones or sound systems.
To make Farewell Rally feel different from other rallies, consider incorporating unique elements or themes that are specific to this event.
To speed up the process of bringing up volunteers, consider assigning specific roles and responsibilities to volunteers ahead of time so they know exactly what to do.
It's important to weigh the benefits of lunch cleanup against the effort required to set it up. If it's not worth it, consider alternatives like having designated photo areas in the gym.
Overall, it sounds like you did a great job with your spirit week and rally. Keep up the good work!
Claire
Hey Spirit!
ReplyDeleteGreat job on the last spirit week of the year. I think it was super cute that you made the days all senior themed even if it does constrict the creativity a bit. For things like the bomb threat it might be helpful to have an extra day already booked out for any event that is postponed so that you can quickly turn around and do the event on that day. I think the decs were also super cute and really added to the feel of farewell rally. The rally itself went super well except for some technical difficulties. For volunteers I think it was a good idea to assign certain commissions to certain jobs during the rally since it would both speed up the volunteer signup process but also involves the whole of ASB in the event. Overall I really loved this and all the other spirit weeks this year and I can't wait for next year.
manit
HI Spirit,
ReplyDeleteThis rally was a great finale for 2023. I saw lots of participation in the spirit week, and the senior-themed days were cool (the only thing was that I feel like we've already done a pajama day). I think the campus decs were worth it, it really made the whole week feel a lot more special. One thing I wanted to say was for Rally Prep, make sure to clear up any confusion for facilities so we can prevent the setup issue we had in the gym for tech. Other than that rally prep pretty smoothly on the tech end of things. Sorry about the mic issue by the way (tech will buy new mics next year hopefully)! Also thanks for letting me play the outro music :D spirit went crazy this year amazing job!
- gio
hiii spirit!
ReplyDeletesuch an amazing farewell rally + farewell spirit week! i loved all the special activities that you guys did for seniors from gauntlet, decs, to videos concluding the rally. For the discussion points, I think that you guys should continue doing the daily reels. It showcases Lynbrook spirit from the student body and is also a type of promo. An idea for making the week extra special is playing past hoco skits from fresh,soph,junior, and senior year in the cafeteria during lunch. As for the rally, I don't think lunch clean up was really worth it. When I went inside, there wasn't anybody taking photos. Instead I think cleaning up right after the rally makes people more efficient (maybe because the time crunch makes people more productive). To speed up getting volunteers, I think it could be communicated to COs to ask the crowd who wants participate in the games right when people are coming in. This way there's no need to scramble to get participants. Overall, this final spirit week was so so good!!
- nina
HI SPIRIT!!
ReplyDeleteThank you for putting on another fantastic spirit week! I thought the senior theme was really cute and creative. The only thing was dressing like a senior citizen may have been a little more difficult to participate in, but other than that all of the spirit days looked good to me. The lunchtime activities every single day of the week may have been a lot to plan, but students seemed to really enjoy it and I think it was worth it. As for the rally, I was distributing stickers at the entrance and we still had a lot of leftover stickers afterward. Also since seniors went into the gym through a different entrance, they didn’t get any stickers even though it said 2023 on it. I think it would make more sense to distribute stickers to seniors from the back entrance as well. Overall, great way to wrap up the year and GOOD JOB SPIRIT!!!!!
-Chloe
HAI SPIRIT!
ReplyDeleteThe spirit week was such a dub! The theme was soso cute and creative, and I think the big part about turn out was due to lots of tests being that week. In the future, maybe having more days spread out for people who don't have tests the day after, or having the spirit week earlier/later in the year would also work. As someone who worked on balloon arches, I feel like the stress was just due to not enough turn out...but that can be worked on in the future hopefully. OVERALL, GREAT WEEK I loved it so much!
-ali
Hi spirit! awesome job on farewell rally and spirit week! As always I LOVE the themes and the specific theme for each day. It so unique and special and like how its very different yet it allows more student participation. I think bringing in 23 hoco decs are doable as long as the message was sent through weeks ahead. That way it allows the owner of the decs to plan out when they should be dropping it off to school. Regarding the bomb threat, I think definitely plan another time during lunch for senior olympics to happen since it was a lunch event anyways. Last, definitely keep the reels. It shows how spirit we are as a school and encourage more students to dress up from seeing their fellow peers participate. As for senior token, I've heard a lot of seniors feeling bad rather for only giving out a token to one underclassmen. If possible, seniors could receive around 3-5 but capping at 5, because there are definitely more than more underclassmen that has impacted one of the seniors. Once again awesome job on this event, everything from spirit week to the rally was so well planned!
ReplyDelete~stuollaala
Yo spirit!!
ReplyDeleteWhat a great sprit week to end off the schoolyear. I think everyone was really happy with this one, mainly because of how high quality the PR campaign and themes were. There were some really unique themes this time, which is commend you guys for. I think the senior themed week was cute, and it did work mostly. But overall I think the senior spirited week did a lot to differentiate it. Also, the somewhat somber, melancholy tone at the end was also really nice to differentiate it. It felt good, and I saw a lot of people getting really emotional at the end, all good vibes of course.
~peter
Hello Spirit!!
ReplyDeleteFantastic end of the year with this spirit week. It was super cool to see how you guys incorporated "senior" in to all the spirit days and had events at lunch to display some seniors. I think that if it's too forced it might not be the smartest thing to do every year but I do think its super cool. I also think that the recap reals are a good way to show people (kinda like humansoflynbrook!! can we revive this acc?!?!) I think itd be cool for some classes to create decs or something to show appreciation towards seniors around campus or just having the underclassmen do something cool for their seniors. For setup, I definitely think trying to maximize the amount of fundraisers and attempt to give people coming something to "look forward to" or a good reason to be there as most people sadly yk... I personally liked the lunch cleanup because it's always a struggle trying to squeeze some pictures in with the like 5 minutes we have. Finally, for technical difficulties, tech will try to test and prepare all alternate situations.... We're looking to get new wireless mics next year so hopefully that fixes all the issue (I really hope they do LOL) but yeah great job on ending the year off right!!
-Colin
hi spirit! amazing job on everything, you guys truly made this week as special as it could've been, as a senior im really grateful <3 here's some feedback about the following sections:
ReplyDeletespirit week:
- making the spirit days senior themed was definitely worth it. even thought it might've been harder, it really significantly added to the theme of celebrating seniors
- it was REALLY sweet to see all the decs back one more time, so i think they are worth it, but i know it's also a lot of work. i think the most worth it dec would be the backdrop, so even if planters arent brought back, the backdrop should definitely be kept up
rally set up:
- overall, i think it went well and 4 hours is enough time
- i think people are burnt out and studying for aps by the end of the year hence low turnout, the only way to motivate people is free food
rally:
- the video was really special and i love how it included students from all different groups in the class of 2023
- i think lunch clean up isn't worth it, since people can take pictures with the backdrop outside anyway
overall, great job and thank you for all your hard work this year!
-emma
Hello spirit,
ReplyDeleteI loved the farewell week! The senior themed days were really fun and I really liked the senior themed events throughout the week. I think it really sucked that the senior sports game was cancelled (obviously there is nothing anyone can do about that) but I do think it would be a fun idea to carry into next year. For rally set up, I think that it is just a bad time in the year as there is a lot of high stakes testing approaching. Moving the rally a few weeks earlier may be a solution to this, although that makes farewell pretty early in the year. I think that the gauntlet in the morning of the rally is something that we may want to abandon as it was difficult on the underclassmen on top of normal rally set up, and I think that class officers should be consulted more when things like the gauntlet and outside decs meetings are suggested. The rally itself was really fun and I enjoyed the experience. Great emceeing and great work throughout the year.
- Shyon
hey spirit,
ReplyDeletefarewelll week was a banger for sure. All the days were really fun to dress up for and I could do dumb stuff with all of them. I think maybe moving the rally a few weeks back prior would be a good idea even thougj it may complicate set up a little bit. I think maybe not having guantlet or pomoing it better might be a good idea becasue it seemed to mainly just be asb kids.
Thanks, Sagar.
hi spirit!
ReplyDeletethanks for putting on an amazing last spirit week/rally! i'm sure everyone enjoyed it and made fun memories.
here's a couple points
rally setup
- the slot on thursday is good -> shouldn't have extra time
- people were confused about the locations for balloon making at first, and 2023/2024 ended up being able to use the auditorium lobby (different from the original plan apparently). just make sure to finalize this beforehand
- increasing participation: should personally tell people to come to setup, not just via mass promotion. maybe even investing in a big paper poster (made in beginning of the year) and hang that up in the beginning of thurs.
rally day
- lunch cleanup is more difficult to enforce so i would reommend just keeping it to brunch. people who want to take pics usually have enough time to take pics after the rally. there's a decent amount of people who leaves for brunch, so i'm not sure if there's a high demand for more time to take pics.
- i thought the gauntlet was super sweet but more promotion wouldve been good!
great work spirit! so proud of yall
sarah
hey spirit :D
ReplyDeletethis was a great spirit week and rally. i'm gonna miss the seniors :,) and you did a great job tugging at heartstrings especially with that video at the rally.
some thoughts for your questions:
- i really liked the senior themed spirit days! they were creative and accessible.
- i actually dont think decs are worth the trouble, unfortunately :/ not enough people took photos with them/engaged with them to justify the extra burden it puts on you guys, not to mention the den clutter!
- there was absolutely no way you couldve predicted the bomb threat 😭 but potentially moving 2 games to thursday, or having one at brunch possibly?
- yes, you should absolutely bring recap reels back! especially when they are tiktok trends, theyre so much fun and the student body loves to engage with them.
<3 kyrsten
Heyyy spirit
ReplyDeleteabsolutely amazing spirit week I had such a blast and it was so so fun (my favorite day was the one where I got to dress like an old person because I am one at heart)! It was so so fun and I also really loved the creative promo you guys did (recap reels, etc)! One thing I would say is that maybe making the banners is not worth the effort because they tend to blow away in the wind and I know you guys put a lot of time and effort into it so maybe you can shift that energy into some other sort of promo. Overall, amazing AMAZING job!
- Kimaya
hey spirit!
ReplyDeletequite literally one of the best rallies i've ever seen executed. from the videos during to the speech to dealing with last minute conflicts, i know it must have been extremely successful but you all killed it. some notes for future rallies:
- we should definitely continue rally freebies in front of the den if our budget allows for it. even just glitter stations and/or necklaces would be enough if we try it out next year
- the videos and overall farewell to the seniors was so well executed, definitely something to do next year as well
- the run-in for the senior class was a beat weak, i think that's something more that next year's senior class officers will have to prep in advance. doing it in the gym can be hard but perhaps having them behind a banner on the opposite side of tech and then having them run in to their bleacher spot from there could be considered? just something to discuss during ascc
overall, amazing event and i can't wait for next year's spirit to carry on the amazing rallies<3
- anika
hi spirit-
ReplyDeleteFarewell rally is a rally that more seniors really look forward to, as it is the last one of their high school life. I thought you guys did a really good job making seniors feel special with the tokens and the video, but something felt off throughout the rally itself. I think it might've been how to the other classes, they're sort of being ignored. Without much engagement within seniors and the rest of the classes, the underclasses are sort of just left to watch the seniors be sad. I think it would be nice if they had a chance to write little messages that are handed out during the rally or have a all classes versus seniors game, both to have more engagement from the underclassmen and to differentiate this rally from the others.
hi spirit!!
ReplyDeletethis spirit week was so much fun and i enjoyed decorating the campus for the seniors. definitely keeping the daily reels is a good idea. i really enjoyed watching them, and i think its also a good way to promo. for the spirit days, i really enjoyed it and i don't think it was too hard for anyone to dress up. for the bomb threat situation, that was so unpredictable, but maybe moving it to after school or even tutorial on the other days would be good. another thing to point out, is i think i like the lunch clean up since a lot of the time after rallies, we don't really have that much time to take pictures since we're trying to clean up. however, i think it wasn't the best to have lunch clean up this time since there was also the fashion show going on in the quad so most people wanted to watch and didn't take pictures. i think it should only be done when there isn't another event. overall, loved this spirit week and rally!! i will really miss all the seniors <3
- carrie
Hey Spirit!
ReplyDeleteWhat an amazing wrap-up to our year of rallies! It was the perfect ending to our journey through the year and a great way to say goodbye and remember our graduating seniors. Here is my feedback for Spirit next year.
For the spirit days:
Theming the spirit days on seniors was a genius idea and I really liked it. I believe that it's a great way to make the spirit days feel more cohesive with the final rally at the end of the week. The spirit days actually felt more creative because of the fact that they had to include “senior,” so I hope that this continues through next year.
For the decs, I think that they’re important but not to the extent of taking away time from the actual rally. If the decs are causing too much trouble for Spirit, they should be scrapped.
The bomb threat definitely threw a lot of things off track! I think that in the future, this type of incident probably won’t happen again, since it definitely isn’t something that can be foreseen.
Yes! The daily recap reels were SO cute, so I would love to see them make a reappearance next year.
The more promotion the better! Personally, not a lot of my friends knew that college rejection board was happening, and I think more promo needs to happen. Perhaps getting footage from last year’s college rejection board and making a little hype video to promote the next year’s event could increase some interest.
For Rally setup:
I don't believe that there needs to be more days for rally setup – 1 is enough.
I don't know much about the balloon or backdrop making, but the end result turned out great!
I’m not sure why the turnout for this rally setup was so low, but it might be that people were getting tired of staying after school to help with something that they’re not really required to do. (or don’t really get much out of ) Promotion needs to happen for rally setup, and I think that spirit needs to work on creating more of that high school “vibe,” so it feels more like a casual hang out where you make arts and crafts vs a high stress level grind.
For rally day:
I think the games and activities should feel more “Senior” themed. Spirit can really lean into the whole farewell idea. I think that Spirit could have the entire gym sing a silly goodbye song to the seniors, and have the senior farewell video be longer.
The process of bringing up volunteers was pretty good, I’m glad that Spirit had all the volunteers practice beforehand!
Spirit is getting better and better at handling technical difficulties! Good job at adapting to the broken mic.
Overall, great job Spirit, and I’m so excited for next year!
- Chelsea