Mackenzie Hurlbert – Copy Editor –
Preparation for a Very Vegas Homecoming has begun, and this year organizations have developed some new events and performances intended to bring the Strip to Southern.
Events for the upcoming celebration include the yearly pep rally, football game and parade while also featuring some new additions.
Along with Vegas-inspired decorations, magicians and Elvis impersonators, the new additions to this year’s homecoming will include a bingo night and a performance by actor and comic John Witherspoon.
Colleges Against Cancer member, Jessica Weimann makes a banner.
The Very Vegas Homecoming celebrations will begin Wednesday, Oct. 10 and continue through Saturday, Oct. 13.
Homecoming committee chair Eric LaCharity is looking forward to the upcoming Vegas-inspired events.
“We have a different theme every year. As long as I’ve been a graduate intern we’ve talked about doing it,” he said. “The events will have a very Vegas-Casino feel to them…We’re going to try to transform the ballroom into a Vegas nightclub.”
The Homecoming events begin Wednesday with a bingo night.
Thursday night there will be a pep rally at Moore Field House and a dance party to follow in the Adanti Student Center ballroom featuring DJ Big Man from Hot 93.7 FM radio.
Friday’s event will be a Vegas movie night, and Saturday will be filled with activities including the annual tailgate and football game, the Homecoming parade and a performance by comedian John Witherspoon.
Along with the new theme, the bingo night taking place on Oct. 10 is a new event that needed a lot of planning and time. Permits had to be acquired from the state in order for this event to be possible. These complications resulted in a lot of paperwork for the committee.
“For four or five months we’ve been working with the state on getting approval to do it,” said LaCharity.
Freshmen in Professor Simoneau’s inquiry class prepare Homecoming decorations.
According to LaCharity, bingo hasn’t been held at the school in at least five years, and he saw Homecoming as a nice platform to bring it back. “The prizes are pretty extravagant,” he said and listed off a series of items including iPads, iPods and video game systems. The paperwork is still being finalized but the outcome is near.
“I’m looking forward to the event,” said grad intern and Homecoming committee member Nikki Hutchinson. “I think it’s going to be an awesome theme.” In her seventh year at Southern, Hutchinson and the committee have been behind most of the paperwork necessary for the bingo night.
“It’s a lot of state requirements to abide by,” said Marcus Diorio, an undergraduate student on the Homecoming committee. “We’re almost there. We’re waiting on two more things; then we’ll be good to go.”
While planning for the Homecoming committee began as early as late spring 2012 semester, clubs and organizations on campus have more recently been planning and designing their banners and floats to display school spirit.
“I’ve had to make the banner for West Campus,” said West Hall Council President Wesley Boucher. “We were going to do a float, but we didn’t have enough manpower.”
Boucher remembers last year’s Homecoming as being a lot of fun and having a lot of people, and he hopes for a successful turnout this year. “If they can pull it off, it’s going to be big,” he said about the Very Vegas theme.
German exchange student Rikki Profit plans to go to Homecoming to experience what she classifies as an “American” event.
“I basically just want to see how typically American it is. Homecoming is the American thing,” said Profit. “I think it will be super interesting to see the school spirit and all that stuff. It’d be cool to see how many people go.”
This highly anticipated Very Vegas Homecoming will incorporate all the flash, glitz and bright lights of the Las Vegas Strip. LaCharity even mentioned that a roaming magician, an Elvis impersonator and other Vegas characters will be wandering around during the parade.
“We’re hoping it turns out really well,” said LaCharity.
