“There’s no excuse.”
“Upperclassmen will give you a ride.”
“This is one of the biggest games of the season.”
These are expressions every Upper School student is familiar with by now. Just two weeks into the school year, attendance at sports games was already lacking, with a dismal showing at the varsity field hockey game against Georgetown Visitation. This game had a student section so weak that the senior blue and gold captains got up at assembly and asked earnestly for people to show up and show out for their classmates, using the same frequent phrases we’ve become accustomed to.
The general sentiment is that students want to come together over sports, with one student stating, “I like going, I understand why we should go, but sometimes it’s too last-minute.” If Upper School students are told there’s no excuse, but attendance continues to be low at sports games, is the problem really availability, or could this be indicative of a larger issue?
While sports game attendance may be the loudest ask of our community, it is not the only ask. Students and staff alike have been trying to facilitate a strong community in the Upper School, with renewed efforts at Big/Little sister activities and Ms. Díaz announcing at assembly that students should sit with someone new at lunch. This small change would ideally strengthen student connections in the Upper School.
Now more than ever, students are being told how to engage with their community. “When I was younger, everything seemed sorta just bigger, like it felt like the high school was bigger, and more spirited, definitely,” says a senior who has been at Stone Ridge since fourth grade. Students feel this lack of connectedness in the Upper School, and many hope to strengthen it back to what it once was.
Should community be something we are told how to participate in, or is it meant to form naturally? “I do think we need to come together as a community to have more spirit,” said one senior, who came to Stone Ridge as a freshman. Although community and spirit may not be the same as they used to be, many seniors feel that the unity we once felt is not out of reach. Seniors stated that “we’re a strong community”, which shows itself in ways we may not notice immediately. Through “making a big deal out of people’s successes” or when “it’s a birthday in the cafeteria, and everyone claps and sings”, those are the moments when students are reminded what Stone Ridge stands for and how it brings people together.
Spirit can’t quite be defined in words, but at Stone Ridge, it’s everyone cheering at assembly, going all out for spirit week, and dancing and singing with classmates during locker room dance parties. One senior says she hopes to see a strong community return and “continue the legacy of Stone Ridge having a lot of spirit.” Maybe the lack of attendance is not a sign of hard times to come, but rather a speed bump on the way to building community back to what it once was in the Upper School. In the meantime, let’s remember to appreciate the quieter ways we show up for each other every day, from lending a calculator to a classmate to bringing in snacks to share with the whole advisory.
