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Homecoming 07
Big fun for WHS this week for homecoming

Royal WHS students will take part in a number of homecoming activities this week, including a 1:30 p.m. parade on Friday.

Royal WHS students will take part in a number of homecoming activities this week, including a 1:30 p.m. parade on Friday.

Don't be surprised to see a number of Williams High School (WHS) boys dressed up like girls today. A few of the girls may also look a little more masculine than normal. It's not a new fashion trend, however; these students are just taking part in a little homecoming 2007 zaniness. As part of the homecoming tradition, students at WHS dress in a number of kooky outfits throughout the week. On Monday, students were invited to wear pajamas and slippers to school, while on Tuesday they participated in "tacky tourist" attire. Today students were giving the opportunity to dress like the opposite sex for "Cross Dress Day." Tomorrow is "Clown Day," with "Spirit Day" rounding out the dress up opportunities on Friday.

WHS teacher Kristi Fredrickson said, besides dress up days, most of this year's homecoming activities would not begin until tomorrow.

"There's not that many activities outside of dress up until Thursday, then the bonfire is Thursday at 7:30 at the Rodeo Grounds," Fredrickson said. "The city puts together the bonfire. They don't want anybody to bring wood anywhere. The bonfires were getting really out of control when we were doing them at Lake Ellen - to the point of being dangerous. The city digs out kind of a pit; they build it up with their own wood. Usually the senior football players light it. It's one of my favorite things to go to."

School spirit

"Friday is spirit day and there's a whole bunch of different things that go on," Fredrickson said, adding that the schedule of events for Friday are still considered tentative. Activities include powder puff football, the egg toss game, pyramid building, tug of war, boy's volleyball and many others. A barbecue is planned for noon in the WHS parking lot and the annual homecoming dance will be held from 9-11:30 p.m. Friday night as well.

"We will be done with all of the activities in the morning by noon, then there's a barbecue in the parking lot and then the parade is at 1:30 p.m. on Friday," Fredrickson said, adding that this year's homecoming royalty will be visible during the parade. She also explained how each royal student is chosen each year.

"For the underclass royalty we just put together a list of all the boys and all the girls in each class, for freshmen, sophomores and juniors, the class votes for one boy and one girl. The highest vote-getter is that class's royalty. For the senior class - the seniors vote for three people, three boys and three girls," Fredrickson said.

Voting for the senior royalty occurred last week. Winners for this year's crowns will ride in Friday's homecoming parade down Route 66 in downtown Williams. Returning senior royalty also gets the chance to ride in the parade.

"There are three boys and three girls for the senior class," Fredrickson said, adding that voting out of those three occurs tomorrow to determine the senior king and queen.

Royalty includes the king and queen, the prince and princess for the junior class, the count and countess for the sophomores and the duke and duchess for the freshmen.

"Student council does homecoming, but everybody helps out," Fredrickson said. "I'm really fortunate to have the staff here, my colleagues that I work with, because we've been doing kind of the same type of events for several years now and so people just know what they're supposed to do. We have a teacher from each class that the kids check in with for dress up days. We all go in the lobby before lunch everyday and judge who's first place, second place, and third place. The kids get class points for the dress up, for all the activities they do during the week. One of the classes wins the overall homecoming stuff, because the floats, everything they do during that week is worth points. I have a teacher from each class that they check in with each day and then on Friday there's certain teachers that always do the barbecue and there's certain other teachers that help with refereeing the powder puff game, where the girls play flag football and then come back and check into class after the powder puff game and then the boys play volleyball."

Fredrickson said the tradition of homecoming is designed for past graduates to come back and visit the high school.

"We would love to have any past graduates attend the parade and the football game. They're welcome to come to the dance," she added. "I would like to see homecoming be more of a community event."


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