To us, school spirit means the crowd at a Friday night football game. The game is tied at 14 all. Five seconds left on the clock. One chance to score a touch down determines whether we make it to state. The crowd heckles a pre-pubescent freshman on the other team, “Hey you! Yeah you! Does your Mommy know you’re out this late?” At the final buzzer, the baby faced assassin scores the winning touchdown. State is lost. There isn’t a dry eye in the house.

But at Marlborough, we lack spirit beyond working hours.

We’ve heard of friends at Harvard Westlake waking up at 6:30 on a Saturday morning to drive to Anaheim and cheer on the boys basketball team.

Why don’t we all wake up at 6:30 am to go support our bomb basketball team? Here, pajama day and banner day, both mandatory events, make up the bulk of our school spirit. We’re required to be at school between 7:30 AM and 3:00 PM, but when the bell rings, we don’t stick around to paint our faces purple and white.

We at the UV would really like some more spirit. Maybe it’s not so easy to create at an all-girls school. For sports, for instance, we lack the football players that look oh-so-good in their uniforms – and just as important, boys in the stands. Therefore, our games lack the typical co-ed draw, and maybe there isn’t as much social incentive for girls to attend. It goes beyond sports. Drama Ensemble’s great play “Uncommon Women” didn’t sell out. How many guys will you find in the seats at a play about feminism, some might say?

However, lack of guys is not at all a valid excuse for never showing up to a school sponsored event. Guys are great, but we can have spirit without them, and at an all-girls school, we just need to. We need to stop thinking enthusiasm is uncool and make a real effort to support our friends and classmates.

Clearly, school spirit goes beyond the guy issue. If history repeats itself, almost every single speech we’ll hear during elections next month will involve a promise to provide more fun activities with boys and food. This year, all-school council finally fulfilled that promise and put on the Arts and Music Production (AMP). Artists and musicians from schools around LA came (including boys) and a delicious taco truck was present (food).

So, why weren’t we there? We’ve heard distance as an excuse – nice try, but kids from other schools showed up, and drove, too. We’ve heard that juniors and seniors have better things to do on the weekends than go back to school. No doubt. But, the one time this year council actually puts something together, we decide we have something better to do? Coming to support, regardless of other time commitments, is the definition of school spirit. Heard it was lame? Heard it was just a bunch of ninth and tenth graders? Heard of a self-fulfilling prophecy, anyone?

We understand you can’t make it to every sporting event or arts performance, but we can try harder to attend more of them. When the school’s leaders respond to the changes we asked for – no, begged for – then we should make the effort to show up.