Parent & Student Handbook
Senior Night
Senior Night occurs once a year during the football season. It usually takes place at the last regularly scheduled home football game. The purpose of Senior Night is to honor the seniors and their parents from the football team, cheerleaders, majorettes, color guard and band.
Traditionally, the seniors and their parents are honored by having the parents escort their senior student across the football field at a ceremony before the game. As the student and their parents walk across the field, they are introduced to the audience and a list of the student's accomplishments and future plans are announced.
The Senior Band Night – The senior band, color guard and majorettes have additional traditions that help make Senior Night a little extra special. One of these traditions has been the selection and performance of the Senior Night Song. The seniors are permitted to choose one song from a list of all of the songs that they have performed over their 4 years in the band. The full band then performs this song as part of this one time only half time show. The seniors are brought to the front sideline and they are featured during our only "stand-still" song of the entire year. As an additional honor, the senior band members are permitted to perform this evening without wearing their band hats. The purpose of this is to permit the audience to see the faces of these seniors who have performed for their entertainment over the last four years. Since this is the last time the seniors will perform for the home crowd, we usually read the seniors names at the conclusion of our half time show. Our hope is to make the seniors last performance a memorable experience for them.
The band, color guard and majorette students have a few traditions of their own for the evening. These student driven traditions have evolved over the years and have occasionally been modified by the band staff. One of these student traditions has been the practice of exchanging gifts among the students. At one time it was the student's practice to have each squad purchase a gift for their departing senior squad leader. This practice evolved to where all senior members were presented gifts from the underclassmen regardless of squad leader status. This has further changed to the point where the seniors now present the underclassmen with gifts as well. Although we have taken a neutral position on this gift exchange practice, we do recommend that the students do not spend an extravagant amount of money on these gifts. Some students have been very mindful of cost and done things like make craft gifts or use food items as gifts. Of course this is all a purely voluntary practice and no student should feel obligated or pressured to participate in this gift exchange. In the same topic, a student should not feel slighted or "dissed" if they are not presented with a gift. It is the camaraderie that is the important part of the band experience and not the trinkets. The students are allowed to mingle and socialize with each other during the 3rd & 4th quarters of the football game. Although this is a special night, the regular rules for the students still apply.
We believe that this special night is solely for the students and we discourage direct adult involvement in their celebration.