McCallion
Quest

A New Look Has “Stormed” into HMC!

But is it the Answer to Boosting School Spirit and Active Participation??? 

By: Melissa Jung, Editor

There has been something new this year to Hazel McCallion School for year 2005-2006. The Phys-Ed department decided to give out T-shirts to every student and teacher in the school. This was made possible from part of the $30 ‘activity’ fee that each student had paid at the beginning of the year. These brightly coloured shirts are meant to categorize each student into their house league team, named appropriately for a variety of storms. Keeping with tradition that we are named after our mayor “Hurricane” Hazel, we have named each house league team after 6 types of storms, each with its distinguished colour: Twisters (Yellow), Monsoons (Purple), Blizzards (Blue), Typhoons (Navy Blue), Tornadoes (Orange), Cyclones (Red).

The students are expected to wear their shirt to Phys-Ed, to assemblies or to “House leagues” in an attempt to build school spirit.  House leagues, an event that takes place periodically at lunch recess, invites any student to attend when their “team” is playing that day. Throughout the school year, the athletes, who decide to attend, will play an assigned sport that’s taking place at the time. House Leagues run during several weeks at a time, and include such sports as mini-soccer, volleyball, basket-ball, etc. They play a few games, each about ½ an hour long throughout the weeks, then, depending on their record, there are additional playoffs. These games are refereed by the house league captains, responsible students chosen by the phys.ed department as a leadership opportunity. These captains not only referee, they often take active roles in helping out in a variety of ways with other activities relating to sports. Once the students have attended a house league event, they get points for their team. Each grade is separate and the boys are kept separate from the girls. At times, there are not enough participants for a team and there are defaults. When this occurs, teams may be mixed just to get a game going. Hopefully, the shirts, and the different teams, will make these activities more interesting and more competitive, and will encourage more students to show up. To date, the plan to boost house league involvement has come up short. Very few students are attending.

But the shirts have been getting mixed reviews. Some students like the shirts as they do show more school spirit and to some, it’s interesting to be on the same team as your teacher, and 1/6 of the school. A grade 8 student from Hazel said, “I think the house league shirts are worth our money because it makes the athletic activities more interesting and helps to distinguish the teams when we are playing. It is also good for spirit at assemblies.”

However, some students don’t think the shirt is worth the money nor do they feel it accomplished its purpose of boosting school spirit and house league attendance. Many feel that the T-shirts do not do enough to encourage students to participate. Some simply don’t get the T-shirt as it is not their favorite colour and many aren’t on teams with their friends they want to be with, meaning they feel ‘different’ when they are in a school spirit function or assembly. Perhaps it was a waste of time and money to get something students really don’t want and perhaps we, as a school, need to do more than just give out a shirt to help the students develop more spirit towards different activities and to encourage them to become more active.