With Spirit Week and all the Homecoming festivities a little more than a week away, senior Jinsol Kim, president of the Student Government Association, is beyond busy.

“Preparing for Homecoming has been stressful. Just doing all the little jobs, like selling shirts and supervising volunteers, is really overwhelming,” Kim said. “But I’m beyond excited to start decorating the halls and get this show on the road.”

Because of the Oct. 13-14 fall break, students will have a three-day Spirit Week starting on Wednesday, Oct. 15. It begins with Character Day when students dress up as a character of their choice. Thursday is Spirit Day. Students show their school spirit by wearing school colors and T-shirts. Friday is Decades Day, which means the freshmen will dress for the 1950s, sophomores the ’60s, juniors the ’70s, and seniors the ’80s.

Many students look forward to Character Day and spend a lot of time coordinating their ideas or creating a costume.

“Leslie Logan, Olivia Phillips, Baylee Smith and I are going to dress up as the band Kiss and wear black, leather skinny jeans and heavy black and white make-up,” junior Sydney Mayson said.

“My friends and I have a lot of ideas for Character Day, but I think we are going to dress up as cops and criminals,” senior Eric Sutliff said. “We just want to keep it simple and memorable.”

Spirit Week also involves members of each class decorating their designated hallways around a theme chosen by SGA. Earlier this school year, members of SGA met to discuss possible themes.

“The chosen theme is Manhattan Mystique,” said Whitney Shoemaker, faculty sponsor of SGA. Manhattan Mystique is a look at New York through the decades. Freshmen will decorate the 800 hallway as Central Park. Sophomores will transform the 600 hallway into Radio City Music Hall. The juniors will recreate Times Square in the 700 hallway. The seniors’ challenge is to turn the cafeteria hallway into the lights of Broadway. Students will start decorating on Friday, Oct. 11, after school and will continue working over fall break.

The Homecoming parade will begin at 5 p.m. on Thursday, Oct. 16. “Thirteen floats are participating, ranging from the Interact Club float to the Executive Board floats,” Shoemaker said. “The floats will be decorated with the Manhattan Mystique theme too. Usually the decorating begins after school on the Monday before the dance by students who are involved in that particular club or class.” Even though it’s fall break, students will still decorate floats on that Monday and Tuesday, Shoemaker said.

The parade, which will begin at Braelinn Elementary and continue down Robinson Road before turning onto Panther Path and ending in front of Panther Stadium, usually lasts about 45 minutes.The Panther Pride Marching Band  will lead it off and set the pace. Participants, including members of the Homecoming Court, hand out candy to children lining the streets.

Members of the court are seniors Eden Aanstoos, Kayla Feigenbaum, Olivia Fields, Taylor Haney, Anna Voso, Emma Wernecke, David Brunskole, Taylor Brunskole, Matthew George, Storey Mizzell, Kale Walker and Kurt Wenske. Junior class court members are Maria Curry, Olivia East, Samantha Herr, Dylan Patterson, Anthony Davis, Dhruva Jandhyala, Davis Murphy and Shaaz Peerani. Court members for the sophomore class are Emily Clevenger, Caroline Dillon, Jocelyn Gao, Christie Shanahan, Brian Buck, Kevan Kadkhodaian, Craig Riley and Ja’vohn Stuckey. Freshmen nominees are Rachel Brown, Claire Goins, Sabrina Greco, Elizabeth Holley, Jonathan Baxter, Cade Donaldson, Eric Donevant and John Webb.

Parents of the participants usually drive the parade vehicles, which are a mix of cars and golf carts.

In past years, the parade and the game were held on consecutive days, but this year, the game against Morrow will begin at 7 p.m. Thursday, not long after the parade ends.

“I’ll probably get ready before the parade at my house and then go back to my house to change for the court when the parade is over,” Aanstoos said. “I am wearing a casual outfit for the parade and a formal dress for the game.”

But the festivities don’t end there. The Homecoming dance, sponsored by the Sophomore Class, will have a Great Gatsby theme and will be held from 7-10 p.m. Friday, Oct. 17, in the gym. The gym will be decorated in black, white, silver and gold, reflecting the colors of the movie. Tickets for the dance are $20 at the door and $15 during all three lunches. Anyone attending the dance who is not a Starr’s Mill student must show ID.

The dance is held the day after the game because of the late endings of past Homecoming games. With all the preparations and clean-up involved in the Homecoming dance, students were only allowed a short amount of time to attend the dance before they were required to go home. This year the game and dance will be held on different days to allow students plenty of time to enjoy both events.

“I’m really excited for the dance, and the Homecoming T-shirts actually look good this year,” sophomore Lindsey Flanders said. SGA held a contest for the T-shirt design and Kim won.  “I voted for Jinsol’s design because it was simple and had good coloration,” SGA member Christie Shanahan said.

Shoemaker said they sold 192 shirts, with almost $1,000 in sales coming on the last day after parents received an email through Infinite Campus.   “We just notified parents the last day of sales” was coming up, Shoemaker said, and  “suddenly everyone seemed to want one.”

Homecoming week seems to have a little bit of something for everyone to enjoy.  “The shirts look awesome and I can’t wait to decorate the halls,” senior Parker Langham said. “I’m sure the dance is going to be good.”  This year’s dance will be a semiformal event rather than a casual event like the two previous dances. While most students are excited about the chance to dress up, some will remain casual.

“I like being casual for the dance,” junior Lily Kocsis said. “It makes it easier and less stressful than having to dress up.  Even though I’m going to dress up, I feel like I’m going to enjoy it anyway.”