Students will need to hurry to participate in Homecoming preparations, and this year may be the last Homecoming with floats.
This year, students will need to jump right in during the first weekend of school to get their Homecoming floats ready in time for Oct. 9, which may be MVHS’s last Homecoming with floats. Scheduling factors pushed Homecoming forward two weeks from last year, with float building starting on the first Saturday of the school year, Aug. 29. Since the football league schedule is built first, administration decided that the ideal game for Homecoming would be the one on Oct. 9, as it is a home game without a pre-planned theme such as Senior Night or the Helmet game (MVHS vs. Cupertino High School). Additionally, the earlier the game, the less chance spectators and athletes will get rained on.
"Even though it’s harder on the kids in terms of building floats," Dean of Students Denae Moore said, "it’s better for the actual overall Homecoming experience."
Besides scheduling changes, district-wide school renovations taking place over the next few years make it unlikely that MVHS’ tradition of Homecoming floats will continue to take place after this year. Sand tracks at all five district high schools will be replaced with a synthetic, all-weather track.
Due to weight limitations for the track and potential maintenance issues with car fluid leakages and the movement of tires on the synthetic surface, floats cannot be driven on the track. The Homecoming Court’s usual T-bird cars will also be taken out of the Homecoming festivities, as they pose the same automotive problems as the floats.
ASB Leadership and the student body are brainstorming alternatives to the floats so that other classes in future years will have the same festive gaiety.
"We’ll probably be having more emphasis on skits than we’ve had in the past," ASB treasurer
senior Christine Tedijanto said. Many students will be sorry to see the floats go as they are a matter of school and class pride.
"[MVHS] is the only school that does floats," sophomore Ben Yang said. "It makes it kind of unique and [doing something else] really takes away from the Homecoming experience."
Even though this year’s Homecoming will be the end of a long standing custom, it’s not the end of homecoming fun for MVHS.
"This year will have the say about what happens next year and set new tradition for [MVHS]," Moore said. "It’s not the same thing over and over again, it’s something new. It’s time to get creative."
