School Spirit: Where did it go?
Isabella Aguirre
November 11, 2023
Over the past years Seaside High has experienced a lack of students that would happily and willingly support their school. School spirit is demonstrated through spirit weeks, rallies, student sections at games and many other ways. The staff and leadership members at Seaside High try to keep the school spirit alive but without the participation of the students they might feel discouraged to continue doing so. Why is this happening and what could we do to keep the school spirit alive?
One of the reasons that could be the cause of the lack of school spirit might be the association with the school itself. School might be negatively perceived because students feel they are legally required to be here and don’t see any purpose to attending their classes. Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence had a nationwide survey in 2018 and they found, “Out of 21,678 U.S. high school students, researchers from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence found that nearly 75% of the students' self-reported feelings related to school were negative.” In this case, it seems evident why they wouldn’t want to represent their school. Even with the teachers encouragement, school can be sometimes viewed as tiring or a leading cause of stress in a student's life. Joe Hernandez is the Junior Class President and is actively involved in school activities and events. He has also noticed the absence of school spirit in the school and added,
“I do think we have a reputation at this school of not being the best so this kind of makes students not really want to participate. I think it’s also because of how other people act at this school.” There have been many conflicts between students that have ultimately led to fights at Seaside High and this might also cause students to be hesitant supporting their school because of the behaviors they would be associated with.
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Joe Hernandez (Junior Class President) showing off his school spirit at the 2023 Homecoming game.
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Another reason why the school spirit might be lacking is because of the amount of students at Seaside High. With more than 1,000 students attending Seaside High there isn’t a tight-knit community as opposed to a school with a lower student population like Marina High School which has around 500-600 students. Jayden Valero is the Senior Class President at Seaside High School and when asked about why there might be a decrease in school spirit, he replied, “ I think there isn’t a lot of participation because there's a lot of followers in this school and they probably think it's not cool.” With a larger number of students at this school even with a few people not participating it would affect so many others because it's one long chain of people who don’t want to feel “embarrassed” or “dumb.” At the end of the day nobody is going to remember if you wore a silly outfit to participate in spirit week or if you were holding up posters to cheer on your fellow Spartan athletes. Participating in school spirit is something that you enjoy in the moment.
Spartan Cheerleaders supporting the football team at the homecoming game.
School spirit takes more than a group of people, it's a school-wide effort and with more participation it can positively affect the school and create a stronger community. It would create a better school experience for the student body because they would come to school looking forward to showing off their school spirit and be able to do that with friends and fellow Spartans.
You don’t have to go all out either, you can join a club, try out for a sport, participate in spirit weeks or go to a game to cheer for our spartan athletes! We can all work toward a common goal of strengthening our school spirit and supporting each other while doing so.
