By: Shalom Montero.
LEESBURG, VA-Spirit week starts off as a week where we get to put on wacky outfits and go to school with more than just jeans and a shirt; however, with the group of students that dedicated their time to making sure that Spirit Week was more than just a week, the junior hallway looked as splendid as it did. The junior volunteers made the hallway look much better by adding their own touch to the theme “Sweet Dreams.” They did a great job and managed to come in second in the hallway. The support of the students was shown on Thursday, October 13^th in the afternoon, when students stopped by to help with decorating the junior hallway. In the end, the juniors managed to pull off one very sweet candy land.
The teachers and junior class sponsors of the junior hallway were Mrs. Caruthers and Mrs. Kristan. They led the juniors whenever they needed good advice, yet they gave them the independence to make it their moment and also to show their artistic ways. Leading the juniors was class elected president, Nathan Huet, and the class elected vice-president, Sarah Hilado. They worked well together to make sure that everyone was able to have a say and get as many ideas on the table as possible. The juniors thought that their president and vice-president did a very good job, and they all expressed their feelings: “Tremendous work!”; “They were open to listening to other ideas and they tried to incorporate them as best they could”; “Above and beyond…”; “Sarah was largely involved”; “Without them we wouldn’t have gotten to the final product.” These are just some of the words of the students themselves. The students all agreed on the idea that their president and vice-president did an amazing job making sure that everything was pitch perfect.
The students gave their own time after school and during some meetings before school, where they voted on what theme they were going to use. Once that was taken care of, the students all decided which ideas would be chosen for the theme “Sweet Dreams,” and the idea of Candy Land came to be. These juniors, some with AP courses, and/or a sport that they practice at some point during the day, all took time to help from around 7 to13 hours. They worked on so many individual parts of the hallway, such as Gloppy, Mr. Mint, Gingerbread Area, and the Lollipop section. “Everyone was responsible for everything,” said Mrs. Caruthers. The students all made sure that what they were supposed to bring was ready in time.
The students helped each other whenever they could, and it seemed to be a united race towards the common goal: to win the judges with their decorations, therefore winning the hallway competition. “I was very pleased with how it turned out. I think most people, myself included, believed we had a legitimate shot at first,” said Devon Carter. The juniors had taken second place in the hallway competition. Some of the kids agreed with their ranking because of the theme the seniors had, nightmare. The theme gave them an advantage since it corresponds with Halloween. Other students felt that they had a restriction because of other technicalities that prevented some of their work from looking like planned. Yet they all believed that they could, in fact, have won.
“I helped because a lot of my friends were helping out and I wanted to try and help out the junior class,” said Jennifer Cartwright. Friendship played a key role in the making of the junior hallway. It seemed that most of the people there knew each other one way or another, and this could have been a better way to let more friends know when the juniors would meet. If they chose to share the meeting by a social media, they could have gotten more people and maybe won first place. Friendship was not the only reason other students came, though it was the most common. “I just like to help out with thins when I can, and as an artist I felt as though I would be useful to the others,” said Michael Richardson. Students wanted to help out, but most of all they wanted to see their class win.
On Friday morning the juniors, after all their work and effort, had to take all their decorations down, as did all of the classes. Some students stayed back during some of their classes, and they helped best they could. Students all made sure that the needed materials stayed with Mrs. Kristan and Mrs. Caruthers. The teachers were going to laminate some of the material to preserve them and were also making sure that the things that they needed did not get taken or thrown away. The students made sure to clean up everything that the students had worked so hard on because they would then need it for the float, which was going to be used for the parade that was going to happen at Tuscarora High School.
The students worked for about an hour on the float and they won first place. They worked hard on the float and since they already had all of the material that they would need they just focused on making sure that it looked the best that it could be. Not all the juniors that collaborated on the making of the hallway were able to be there.  However, the ones that were threw candy at people and had a great time. “I felt that we did the best we could under the pressure and time restraint we had. I loved working with everyone and throwing candy as well as putting up all the decorations needed,” said Erika Castro. All their work did pay up, because after all that work they managed to win.
The juniors did a fantastic job, and all of their hard work and efforts paid off quickly.