High School traditions

[PM_Mama00]

What are some of your high school traditions? I guess ours would be considered "hazing" under some of the ridiculous rules.

Senior Bench... speaks for itself. Don't sit on it unless you're a senior, or you'll be asked to move. If you don't move, you chance gettin ur ass beat.

Pirate head.. we had a mosaic Pirate head on the floor of the main front entry lobby where everyone hung out after lunch and between classes. If you stepped on it and someone caught you, you had to scrub it with a bucket of water and a tooth brush after school and EVERYONE stood around to watch. When I was a freshman some people had to. When I was a senior, this one stupid girl stepped on it, claiming she didn't know (uhh yeah she did) so a few of us got the bucket from the Vice Principal, went to her 6th hour class and told her she had to do it. She refused and guess what? She definately got NO respect from anyone after that.

My tennis team... when you were a freshman or first year player, you had to sing this "Beaver" song. Doesn't seem bad, but when you're a freshman goin to this all day camp, and you have 4 senior boys on teh bus... it was HORRIBLE! Everyone screaming at you to sing louder. But after you were done it was hilarious. Even the coach would laugh because she knew that it was a harmless tradition. I wonder if they still do it. My senior year we made the girls do it but we were a lil nicer about it, but then I decided that the freshmen had to get 3 phone numbers while at the all day camp club.

Ahhh the fun high school days!

[AlphaFrog]

We had Senior parking spots...and you did not want to get caught parking there as an underclassmen...the dean threatened to send the football team out to physically move underclassmen's cars who parked in Sr. spots.

[Gina1201]

Originally posted by AlphaFrog
We had Senior parking spots...and you did not want to get caught parking there as an underclassmen...the dean threatened to send the football team out to physically move underclassmen's cars who parked in Sr. spots.

We also had a senior lot.

One of our traditions was on the first day of school the ENTIRE school had an assembly first thing in the morning. I went to a small, private school so for us this was everyone from Pre-K to 12th grade plus all faculty members. Our headmaster would give a boring speech about the new school year. At the end the seniors were each introduced in terms of how long they had been attending the school. Then we lined up along the walkway in the same order and shook every person's hand from 11th grade on down, including faculty again.

We also would have a winter carnival the week before winter break. The entiree week was like spirit week. Each grade would have a color and the seniors would ALWAYS be the blue team. This was because on color day you could wear blue jeans (a BIG thing when you have a dress code)

Other high school traditions:

1. when you were a senior being able to NOT be in school when you didn't have a class.

2. Off campus priviledges for juniors and seniors

3. The junior college tour

4. The senior trip (LOTS and LOTS of fun, we went to NYC for mine)

[AlphaSigOU]

Oh, what fun we had at North Miami Senior High (North Miami, Florida) back 20 years ago...

We had a Senior Patio that sat unused and neglected for the longest time until one of the school clubs cleaned it up as a service project; unfortunately the Class of 1983 didn't get to use it very much.

The center section of the auditorium (as you faced the stage) was reserved for seniors during pep rallies; juniors sat on the right section, sophomores (aka 'Baby Pioneers') on the left. During my senior year the administration instituted controlled seating by keeping classroom groups together (previously it was a free-for-all).

Back when we were sophomores, we could have cared less about school spirit and tradition, and being forced to attend a pep rally wasn't much better. At least until the Slimnastics class took the stage and did their routine... nothing better than getting teenage male hormones in an uproar! One time, during the routine, one of my classmates stood up on the auditorium seat and yelled at the top of his lungs, "SIT ON MY FACE!!!" The sophomore class erupted into wild cheering after that. Needless to say, he was taken down and sent to the office; reportedly he was suspended three days for his antics. Interestingly enough, he graduated two years later in the Top Fifty honor graduates.

Seniors had the south end of the east parking lot reserved for them.

I knew the varsity and JV cheerleaders underwent some kind of initiation when they were selected. What it was, I don't know to this day... maybe I could ask some of the former cheerleaders at my 20-year reunion?

Always a party going on at the gym parking lot after football games; as soon as the football team changed out of their uniforms and equipment (or when the police presence got a little too hot) we hightailed it over to 85th Street Beach Park; where yours truly gained experience in getting totally sh*tfaced. And when the cops ran us off 85th Street, we'd head north to Haulover Cut.

Hey... and don't forget the famous 'senior skip day'!

[LuaBlanca]

Having been in the BAND (well, Colorguard but virtually the same thing) we had a little freshman initiation ceremony that was actually assisted by our instructors. After marching band finals, we always went to this Italian restaurant on the way home for pizza, etc. and we would gather all the freshman together and make them do various things. For instance, in the past this event has been a Karaoke Contest, "Who's Line is it Anyway?," a simple talent show, "Jeopardy", "Survivor/The Bachelor/Who Wants to Marry the Drum Major?" etc. Also- there is always a wedding of 2 freshmen (usually the boy and girl who win the contest part of it, unless there is an extenuating circumstance like an upperclassman's younger sibling or etc.)

For Colorguard we had this game we played on the freshmen at midnight during our annual 24-hour rehearsal. It was kind of like charades, w/ a chair in the center of the "stage." All the freshmen were herded outside and given various "personas" to act out for the audience (upperclassmen) to guess. The catch- they have to remain on the chair. The other catch- they don't know this, but everyone in the "audience" already knows what is being acted out and is guessing everything BUT the CORRECT answer. Also- the chair is supposed to be visualized as a toilet, so what the person is acting out is, in the mind of the audience, them using the bathroom. (Some particularly funny actions: giving birth, watching fireworks, waiting for a bus that never comes, lifting heavy objects, popcorn popping, etc.)

In the Theater Company we always made the freshmen clean the dressing room counters and bathrooms after closing night...with all the make-up and hairspray caked on it...ew...it was gross!

The upperclassmen also made up this legend of "Ignatius" (supposedly a ghost that haunts the cat-walk) but never really come out and say it. They just talk about "him" all the time and when a freshman asks "who?" they say "you know, Ignatius." and then laugh when the freshman pretends to know who "Ignatius" is. Also- it was always a game to see which senior would be the first to get the little freshman thespians to say that "Shakepearean Play-that-starts-with-an-M-and-rhymes-with-'Seth,'" in front of the director whom would in turn, FREAK OUT because of the supposed curse...

fun times

[sugar and spice]

Freshman Trash Day/Senior Holiday Party: The last day of school before winter break was ALWAYS freshman trash day. Apparently in the past it had been worse, where seniors would tape the frosh into trash cans and roll them down the stairs, or things like that. The administration has sinced cracked down on it, and by my freshman year it consisted mainly of a few select freshmen getting duct taped to lockers and some of the rest getting "FROSH" written on their foreheads in permanent marker.

To crack down on trash day several years ago, the administration instituted an official "senior skip day" on what was traditionally freshman trash day. Somewhere along the line, this morphed into a day where seniors would sneak into the school very early in the morning the day of freshman trash day, decorate the main hallway outside of the cafeteria (Christmas trees being the primary source of decorations), and then spend half the morning partying. (Of course, many seniors came to school drunk that day.) The decorations grew more and more elaborate every year, and my freshman year it was rumored that the seniors had brought in over 150 Christmas trees and propped them up all over school. After that year, the admin put a ban on the Christmas trees for two reasons: (1) they were a fire code violation, and (2) rumor had it that many of them were obtained illegally, including a group of senior boys who had gone out and sawed down evergreens off of golf courses! Of course, after that there was a push to make up for the lack of Christmas trees -- my junior year, the hall was filled with millions of foam packing peanuts. Another year, the seniors collected a pair of underwear from every senior and strung them up on clotheslines across the hallway.

Senior, Junior and Sophomore Walls: My school had these walls that were about three feet high that ran through the main hallway. Everybody hung out around them before and after school, sat at them at lunch, etc. One was designated for each grade (except the freshmen, who weren't special enough to have their own) and usually the most popular people from each grade hung out there. It wasn't strictly enforced or anything, though (if you were a sophomore and your boyfriend was a junior, you could still hang out at the junior wall).

Unofficial Senior Skip day: Yes, even though our principal handed us a free skip day in December, we went to school on the official skip day and waited til May to actually skip out of school. We were screwed up. Upperclassmen also didn't have to go to school on the first day . . . that was for freshmen only, so they could have a chance to get used to the new school without all of us scary big kids there.

[sugar and spice]

I remembered some more.

If you were involved in the theater department, after the spring play, all the seniors got to paint their name and graduating year on the wall backstage somewhere. There are names written backstage that go back to the 1950s . . . it's really cool to see all the people who have done theater there, and I hope to come back someday when I'm old and see all the new names.

We had Homecoming in the fall, complete with Spirit Week, powderpuff football, a parade with floats, Homecoming Court, a pep rally, the football game and a dance. Around Valentine's Day, we had a similar thing (a little bit more low-key) called TWIRP, which stood for The Woman Is Required to Pay. (This is apparently a Wisconsin thing, since I know a bunch of other kids who went to high school in Wisconsin and also had a Sadie Hawkins-esque dance called TWIRP, but nobody in any other state that did.) TWIRP had Spirit Week, a pep rally, a dance and TWIRP Court. I was on TWIRP Court as a senior, but I don't like to tell people that because "TWIRP" sounds so silly.

Looking back, I think one could probably consider our traditions "hazing".

As freshmen, we were paired up with a junior and she would be our big sis. I went to an all girls' Catholic school, btw. A week in September was Freshman Initiation week, and each day would have a theme, in accordance for the theme of the week. The freshmen were showered with gifts and other goodies because it's such a special time...we wanted each girl to feel welcome because they were the newbies at Sacred Hearts Academy. It all culminated in Friday's Pep Rally, where each freshman was dressed up and paraded around the gym. When I was a freshman, the theme was "Back to the Future", and I was a cave babe! I dressed my little as one of the Brady Bunch kids...my little clique in HS got together and did the same thing.

We also had the Senior Pavilion, and it was OFF LIMITS to underclassmen. There were only two pay phones on campus, and one was in the Senior Pavilion. The other pay phone was usually busy and someone was usually on it, but if you got caught in the Pavilion, you woulda had ISHT to pay.

My class...the class of 1997, started a new tradition...SENIOR BREAKFAST. We cut homeroom and first period to have breakfast across the street at Columbia Inn. We did it during Senior Finals week, but now I hear that the administration doesn't know when the senior class will cut. Upon returning from breakfast, we disrupt the entire school by marching back singing the alma mater and other fight songs.

We got detention for it...90 girls picking up trash afterschool, and they threatened to not graduate us, but now they can't do anything about it because it's become tradition! It feels cool to start something like that.

[AOX81]

Originally posted by PM_Mama00
Senior Bench... speaks for itself. Don't sit on it unless you're a senior, or you'll be asked to move. If you don't move, you chance gettin ur ass beat.

We also had a senior bench. At my school the senior class always gets out a couple weeks before the underclassmen. As our senior prank our class stole the senior bench and put it in the auditorium of the sports arena where we had graduation. When the juniors walked into school on the following day (with no seniors) they were very shocked to see that they had no senior bench to claim. They were soooo pissed!! It was awesome!

[smiley21]

my list is short, cause i hated senior year and i hated my school even more.

we had the unofficial senior skip day. if you had the guts, you didnt show up for class.

we have the senior daughter/ mother tea

we had the homecoming parade complete with silly games between the football players, cheerleaders, and coaches

we used to have spirit week. one day was clash day, the next was future occupation day, cowboy day, formal day, and school colors day. however my dumb school didnt like the dress code of the students that week, so they cut it down to formal day and school color day.....some spirit

we also used to have big sis/little sis. (senior girl/junior girl) there were exchanges of gifts and semi formal brunch. but it discontinued my senior year.

i am so glad to be out of high school!!!!!!!!!!

[CutiePie2000]

I went to a Boarding School so I have some interesting ones!
1) When you are in Grade 12, the grade 12 class decorates the cafeteria and makes breakfast for the school in a "theme". We were pretty angry at the Administration at the time so we did a "Breakfast from Hell".

2)Just in my house, the grade 11 girls would produce a fashion show where the first half was the grade 12 girls modeling their Grad dresses. The second half, we had them wear a dorky outfit. It was so fun.

3) We were located near the ocean, and we offered rowing (crew). If your rowing crew won a race, then you threw the coxswain into the water afterwards! (The coxswain is the little person who sits in the boat who barks encouragement to you while you are rowing your little heart out! They don't actually row themselves). Actually, throwing your coxswain into the water is a pretty standard thing for winners of rowing races, but I thought I'd put it up there anyway!!

[33girl]

we used to have that the unofficial senior skip day was whatever your class year was (i.e. if your graduation year was 1982, everyone skipped on the 82nd day of school). The admin started really cracking down on it and by the time I was a senior it was gone.

we also used to sing (to the tune of pomp & circumstance) "the reindeer song" which would be disastrously politically incorrect today. I don't remember all the words, but I do remember that isht was @#$ %ed up.

[SigkapAlumWSU]

We of course had Senior Skip day, and actually, the year I graduated, I think that we had 2. A bunch of us met for breakfast, then pretty much the whole class got drunk later that day one way or another.

We had Homecoming, and each day of homecoming week was a competition. First of all, we had 4 long halls, so each class was assigned a hall to decorate in their chosen theme. We've done Candyland, little mermaid, Wizard of Oz, Super Mario Brothers.. the list goes on and on. The Senior hall always won becuase they had 4 years of experience and it was always the best. It was so funny to laugh at the frosh hall because they always had no ida what they were doing. We also had each day of the week as a dress up day. It always varied, except that Friday was always spirit day. We had color day one, and gave the Freshman Pink as their color. We had a Giant rock on the school grounds, right next to the road, and people painted it all year long. During spirit week, each class painted it for a competition each day. My year, we had a war with the juniors, and after their paining wa done, they brought in a dump truck full of dirt and buried the rock!! they spent the whole night digging it out, and even were egged by the Juniors during the night, but we still won the rock competition. As it turned out, the Juniors were banned from homecoming week their senior year for unsprotsmanlike conduct!!
Our last event was a homecoming skit on Friday which every class did. Once again, the Frosh always sucked. One of the guys in our clas was a professional DJ so all throuhg HS we had professional light and sound, and we always convinced out principal to be in our skit. He drove a Harley and our senior year he got a bunch of his friends and they all drove into our gym as part of our skit, it was great!

[Rio_Kohitsuji]

Ahh....

1. 3 Senior Skip Days We were all lazy, hehe
2. Band: We had a system of having "big's and littles" except the newbies were called "Freshman" until their "Upper" graduated. I have a large family tree consisting of 1 Upper, 3 freshmen, 2 grandfreshmen, and 2 great grandfreshmen!! I personally spoiled mine, my freshmen w/rides down to the field and after I graduated I come back during each band camp and bring ice cream for them, teehee
3. Band: At the beginning of each football game the marching band comes marching down a HUGE flight of concrete stairs that leads down the field.
4. "decorating" Senior Hall and the Band Room, it's a mess
5. Senior Bonfire, it takes place after the Powder Puff game and all the seniors just hang out and talk about the "good ole day's".
6. Staff vs. Senior Boys basketball game
7. Band: On the last football game the marching band goes to the local grade school to have their pep rally. Basically we only play the "good" music and dance, it's freaking awesome to see how the kids get involved
8. Snake Dance- Well, before we play our rival's we have this HUGE event, everyone joins hands and runs through town swinging eachother, the pep band plays (we frequently traded instruments so it was hilarious), the football team rides the semi and we just slink all through the town at night. The roads are all closed off and well, it's just a blast!

[Peaches-n-Cream]

No senior skip day.
No senior parking lot.
No senior bench.

We had a senior lounge. That was fun. Only seniors could hang out there. It was a tiny room near the cafeteria.