Bruins Spirit Week provides many exciting opportunities for BJU students to find entertainment and rally as a student body in the midst of a busy semester. Spirit Week, which begins on Monday, Oct. 8, will build momentum for BJU’s Homecoming and Family Weekend, which officially begins on Thursday, Oct. 11.
The Spirit Week events are designed specifically to unify the student body. Members of the student leadership council have been planning several events for each day of Spirit Week, with some events lasting throughout the entire week.
Bradley Shepard, director of the Community Service Council, is overseeing the fundraising activities, which begin on Monday. Like last year, the CSC will sell coffee and doughnuts on Saturday and will have Homecoming T-shirts available for purchase all week long.
Matthew Weathers, student leadership coordinator, said, “It’s a sweet redesign of the Homecoming T-shirt which was student initiated, student-designed and student-selected.”
Shepard said the proceeds from the fundraisers will go to Let There Be Mom, a Greenville-based organization focused on preserving memories of family members with terminal illness. On Wednesday, students can participate in a time of prayer and worship in War Memorial Chapel at 9 p.m. The evening’s theme of heaven and the believer’s home going is a timely focus, as the very theme of Homecoming week is welcoming alumni back home to their alma mater.
Daniel Kim, men’s student body president, said, “It’s just a reminder of our longing, of our desire, of where we’re going to go in the future.”
Tori Conover, women’s student body president, said the student pep rally on Friday night is an especially good time for students to bond with their graduating class. Student representatives from each class will lead the rally in the Davis Field House at 10 p.m.
“[It] will be a festive time for students to have fun, play games, win prizes and have free food,” Weathers said.
Natalie Larsen, the event coordinator for the SLC, has been working with her team of students to organize the pep rally. Max Burak, sophomore Bible major, and Dillon Frazier, junior communication major, will emcee the evening.
Larsen said the SLC events team plans to have tug of war, dunk competitions, a tic tac toe challenge with a twist, drawings with $500 worth of prizes and other classic pep rally games.
Larsen said her goal is to keep the games simple. “We’ve reverted back to simplistic things that a lot of people can join in,” she said. Rather than having teams of five or six people competing, she said the competitions require at least 10 participants on each team.
Larsen hopes students will come ready to cheer and eager to have lots of fun. Saturday, the last day of Spirit Week, begins with U.Day activities. U.Day, a three-hour event held on front campus, will welcome families from the community onto campus.
Dozens of booths will be set up across front campus. BJU students will staff these booths for their respective organization or academic department. U.Day will feature live music, face painting, food and hands-on science experiments. After U.Day, the women’s soccer team will play Kentucky Christian University at 4 p.m. The game will be followed by a tailgating party in the lower soccer field at 5 p.m. and a men’s soccer game against Kentucky Christian University at 7 p.m.
The Inter-Society Council is sponsoring the student tailgating party on Saturday afternoon. The event will be free to both day students and those living in the residence halls.
“Students really look forward to Homecoming,” Conover said. Although it is a full, busy week, she said it brings the student body together.
“We’re striving towards similar goals,” she said. “We’re holding to things bigger than ourselves.”
Weathers said, “We are thrilled for students to come together around a cause bigger than themselves, interact with the community, meet alumni of Bob Jones University and just have a blast during this week.”
