By Kendall Pritchard

Spirit weeks in Lawrence are considered a vital component to our high school experience — especially when it’s leading up to game time against the self-proclaimed “royalty” at Free State.

But in the past few years, administrators have banned a school-sponsored spirit week leading up to the anticipated games.

“I think it gets the school excited in a positive way for the game against Free State — pumping people up, like the football players, because they see that the whole school is supporting them,” said Hailey Belcher, a three-year cheerleading veteran.

This year, senior class members took spirit week into their own hands.

Senior Marly Carmona did what every other teenager would do and took advantage of social media.

“There is a senior Twitter account, and someone tweeted what we wanted to do for the spirit week,” Carmona said. “So, we decided to share with everyone over Twitter to get favorites and retweets and spread the word.”

Along with Carmona, senior Tim Schraad stepped in to help.

“I feel like it shows initiative and leadership within the senior class to go ahead and take the weight of creating and spreading the ideas to create unity over rivalry week,” Schraad said.

During the week, seniors spread the word of spirit week. Monday was pajama day.

Not only did students dress in their pajamas, they participated in Twin Tuesday, Wacky Wednesday, Throwback Thursday and Formal Friday.

Formal Friday was in retaliation to trash talking from some students at Free State, who began to refer to their school as “royalty” and to LHS students as “peasants.” Who knew that living on a certain side of 15th Street determined your worth? I didn’t.

“I put my whole heart and soul into spirit week,” Schraad said. “It plays a such huge role. It gets everyone ready for the game and a sense of school unity.”

Many of these seniors wish administrators would understand there is no harm in a spirit week.

“I wish they would understand that spirit week is not meant to have a negative effect, and it’s supposed to get everyone excited for the last scheduled game and carry us to the playoffs,” Belcher said. “I wouldn’t think wearing pajamas to school would be negative, but I guess someone thought otherwise. It being my senior year, I want to go all out.”

It may not have been an officially sanctioned school spirit week, but it’s good to see the senior class step up and show how much its cares about not only the football players but the school as a whole.