On Friday, October 10, 2014, Stockton held its annual Spirit Day in honor of Homecoming Weekend 2014. The event was organized by the Office of Student Development and it encouraged students to show their school spirit by participating in various Stockton related activities.

One of these activities included a college t-shirt exchange. If you had any t-shirts or other clothing that came from another college or university, you were able to exchange them in the campus center and receive a new Stockton t-shirt in return. All of the items that were exchanged were donated to the Atlantic City Rescue Mission. Along with the t-shirt exchange, later that night Stockton held its annual Homecoming Ceremony at Big Blue. The purpose for the ceremony was to celebrate and honor all of Stockton’s student-athletes, as well as crown the 2014 Homecoming King and Queen, Mat Greer and Laura Groh. Students who stuck around to see SET’s One Night Stand Up comedy show later on were served free pizza and drinks, and were also given a free Stockton Homecoming 2014 t-shirt.

Based on the amount of people that went to and participated in each activity, it seemed very clear to me that there was no shortage of school spirit at Stockton. Almost every student I saw was wearing at least one article of clothing that represented Stockton, and everyone was having a great time during the ceremony and comedy show. Back in high school, Homecoming always seemed centered around the school’s football team and Homecoming Court, and excluded everyone else. As a Stockton student-athlete, I was pleasantly surprised to see that every Stockton sport was recognized in some shape or form and no one was forgotten about. It’s small things like this that help bring the Stockton student body even closer together instead of separating us by focusing on only certain groups or individuals. Overall, Stockton Homecoming 2014 was a major success and I cannot wait to see what’s in store next year for Homecoming 2015!