By Lilly Fleischmann ’11, Contributor
As a lifer at CCDS, I have attended my fair share of school football games. In middle school, the best thing about games was hanging out with friends in the field behind the concession stand, and in even younger years, it was playing on the playground in the dark. Now, I may not be the most avid of football fans, but I was certainly not alone in that the majority of my activities were not actually related to the game. With so many CCDS students spending their younger years anywhere but the student cheering section, it is no surprise that we have garnered criticism from faculty, students, dining terrace staff, and football players alike for our mediocre-at-best cheering.
It might be tempting to blame our below average cheering on the intellectual quality of our student body. Maybe we are simply so intelligent that we are content to sit and watch the game, passively analyzing every play and recording data like a human Logger-Pro. More likely, the culprit of our lack of spirit is our lack of time. In a place like Country Day, where work is abundant and expectations are high, students just don’t have the time or energy to devote to becoming the type of super-spirited tailgating, body-painting, headdress-wearing fans that can take a few hours on a school night to go to an obscure away game. But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t be taking steps in that direction.
Last year, president and vice-president of student council, Xanni Brown ’10 and Isaac Guttman ’10, instituted a system of cards that rewarded those of us in attendance of certain games throughout the different seasons. It seemed to slightly raise attendance, but it was still only a select few games that seemed to attract a significant number of students. And even when attendance is high, spirit seems low. In my experience, there has always been at least one, if not two or three people, who step up to the plate and lead cheers, most noticeably for the men’s basketball games. I wonder, who will it be this year? And, at the same time, I realize that being this person takes a lot of courage, more than maybe even I have, because this person has to put themselves on the line of embarrassment to get everyone to do the same. But just think for a moment how incredible our cheering section would be if every person, or even every other person, decided to be like that one leader. Our section would be incredible. And think for a moment how much better our athletes might perform if they felt such passionate support from their peers. Just think about it.
It is true that CCDS is a small school, but we shouldn’t be using this as any kind of excuse for our lack of noise in the stands! This should instead be our reason to band together in cheering on the members of our community, since we know everyone so well. I applaud Greg Dick for leading the “rollercoaster” cheer at football games. The student section comes alive when everyone is cheering together and caught up in the fun of it. But then, why does it stop there? I’m still trying to figure out the answer to that question, but I would rather make it obsolete by changing the culture of our student body into a more spirited, more passionate, and all-together louder group of fans. Pride in the tribe!
Photo by Ilana Habib ’11, Photography Editor
