Today: Mar 28, 2024

Digital homecoming brings a new atmosphere

Donovan Wilson Reporter

For the first time, the campus held their first ever digital-only homecoming from Oct. 12 to 17 and it felt somewhat like a desperate and awkward attempt at creating a continued sense of normalcy.

Homecoming is obviously usually one of the biggest, if not the biggest, event on campus during the fall semester. However, with COVID-19 and its regulations now in place, things had to change for it to still be possible. With that being said, the events were either online or extremely small.

There was very little in the festivities that felt different from the events you would see on a usual week in normal times. They were seemingly fun events but they were all pretty much in the vain of giving away prizes to students through an activity or some sort of digital demonstration, activity or conversation.

It just all felt like unrelated events all under the same branding for no reason other than not being able to have a typical homecoming.

Homecoming usually revolves around football as it is a football centric event. As I’m sure you are aware, football and sports in general aren’t exactly happening at the moment.

Still, having homecoming while not having football seems like going to the reception for a cancelled wedding – what are we actually celebrating here?

The sentiment behind the festivities is pretty obvious to me. The higher-ups in the college are obviously trying to continue giving students a sense of normalcy and decided this was the best way to do it. Homecoming is a tradition and having something, even if it is virtual, is better than nothing.

However, if you’re a kid and your mom took away your toy train but gave you a toy plane and called it a toy train, would you be satisfied? Of course not. You know that a plane is not a train.

With all that said, it is a very sweet sentiment and sort of thoughtful way from the school as they are trying to make students feel like they’re still connected to campus despite the distance. The social distancing makes sense, but it felt as if there should have been some other event in place of homecoming that was at the same time but didn’t have the same name.

Calling it homecoming creates an initial hype around it, but due to it being rather a run of the mill, when compared to the usual homecoming activities makes the hype fizzle out very fast. If you bill it differently, you have the potential to draw up better student involvement and excitement.

In the end, homecoming was a success, regardless of how you feel about it personally, because it kept our students happy and most importantly safe.

The fundamentals and logistics could definitely have been better sorted out and the event itself could have been a lot better but the fact that it happened was nice within itself. COVID-19 is hard, to say the least, but we will get through it together and have fun doing so.

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