Olivia Burgan

Juniors Morgan Hoffman and Anna Gagne setting up for Homecoming week.

Homecoming is one of the most exciting weeks at any high school, and North is no exception. In the process of planning Homecoming, many important decisions must be made on how the event will be run.

Homecoming has always been set up and organized primarily by North’s student council, but they have little to no say when it comes to deciding when homecoming week is.

“[Homecoming] is determined based on the football season,” said Cynthia Mihalik, Class of 2024 Student Council Advisor. “But it cannot be kick-a-thon weekend, it cannot be the same as East’s, and it cannot be Scarecrow Fest weekend. So that really limits the number of home games that we have available to us.”

This year, the Homecoming dance was originally meant to take place on Sept. 16; however, this would have been during Rosh Hashanah, a holiday celebrating the Jewish New Year. So, in the spring of 2023, it was rescheduled to take place on Oct. 21.

“We as advisors pushed back against that,” said Mihalik. “For this concept of ‘be here, be you, belong,’ that inclusivity, [the homecoming dance] should not be on a major religious holiday.”

While they may not have as much say about dates, student council is heavily involved in picking the theme of each homecoming.

“The student council gets together and they brainstorm ideas [and] they narrow it down to three options,” said Mihalik.

The student body as a whole then votes on the options put forward by student council to decide the theme. Often, student council has certain criteria when considering themes to put forward.

“We’re looking at themes that have multiple opportunities for each class to create things for,” said Mihalik. “You want it to be a broad enough topic that there’s a lot of different avenues for classes to come up with ideas.”

Student council is also responsible for designing shirts, flags, windows, walls, display cases and golf carts for their respective classes. During the summer, student council members attend a retreat where much of the planning takes place. According to senior student council member Shariq Kapadia, decisions related to homecoming spirit days take place there. The organization benefiting from North’s donation wars during Homecoming week is also decided at the retreat. 

Student council welcomes feedback on Homecoming to help it run smoothly.

“There’s a lot of moving parts from not only just the people in Executive Board, but everyone on student council, and we need student feedback to provide a good homecoming experience,” said Kapadia.