The Evolution of Color Day
Now that color day has past, students are still buzzing about the format of the student performances.
After months of angst and confusion, Pentucket staff finally settled the new guidelines for this year’s Color Day celebration.
For the first time in Pentucket’s history, students of each class presented a twelve minute video to their peers instead of preforming live skits.
Staff members organized this event, which was held on Wednesday, November 27, and teachers created a list of guidelines and requirements for these videos. In addition to the twelve minute time limit, students also must incorporate a choreographed dance of at least twenty students and include Pentucket alumni in order to receive points.
Since decisions such as these were not official until mid-October, class officers were pressed for time to organize and film these videos, which were due the week before Color Day on Friday, November 22.
Many students are greatly upset over this drastic change. Junior Lindsay Ago, isn’t fond of the change. She believes, “videos [weren’t] as fun” and the combination of skits and videos is more interesting. “People like to watch live action.” Like Lindsey, many are disliked the heightened censorship from staff and the lack of humor in videos.
Sophomore Kelly Murray took a more optimistic approach going into color day. Although she is glad students can still participate in creating fun skits, she admits, “I think it’s kind of sad.” She looks forward to watching each class’ video and hopes everyone is involved, regardless of the change from skits to videos.
Although the main idea of the videos is ultimately school spirit, as with live skits, the videos will still focus on an aspect of a school-wide theme. For the 2013 Color Day, each grade will mocked a well-known live TV show. Seniors chose Saturday Night Live, Juniors picked the Ellen Degeneres Show, Sophomores chose the MTV Video Music Awards, and Freshman picked Family Feud.
Despite rumors that the scandalous skit created by the class of 2014 last year triggered the decision to change from skits to videos, staff members assure this has been a plan many years in the making.
In fact, the dramatic change to the Color Day tradition is due to the talent of past Pentucket students. “One class did an amazing lip-dub video which got the ball rolling,” says Mr. Bart, video production teacher and NUMBER graduate of Pentucket. That one music video led to supplementing skits with short videos for future classes and inspired the revolution from skits to videos for 2013.
As it turns out, videos do have advantages over skits. “As fun as live skits are, there will be less chaos,” reassures Bart. Live skits make it difficult for everyone to hear and generate unnecessary mayhem in preparing for presentations. This year, “the skits are going to be done and ready to go” before anyone gets to school on Wednesday. No more stressing over costumes and frantically trying to memorize lines. Not to mention, there is no intimidation or anxiety of having to present in front of the entire school.
Although the usage of videos assures no inappropriate behavior will be displayed on Color Day, Mr. Roy, who has attended his fair share of Color Days during his forty-one years teaching at Pentucket, hopes the videos “don’t lose the spontaneity of the live skits.” He believes Color Day “gives students a way of expression” and greatly compliments the “enthusiasm and cooperation” shown by all of the students.
Mr. Bart agrees saying, “My favorite part of Color Day is that no matter what year you graduated, everyone looks back on it with fond memories.” He recalls winning Color Day both Senior and Junior year in 2001 and 2002 proving that “Seniors don’t always win.”
Kelly loves how Color Day “pumps everybody up and makes everyone excited for school for once.”
Lindsey also believes Color Day generates excitement among Pentucket’s students. The Color Day skits “show a lot of school spirit,” says Lindsey who loves “all the participation” from all her peers.
Whether skits or videos, it is clear the future of Pentucket’s Color Day is bright. “Honestly, my hope [for Color Day] is that it makes it open to everybody,” says Mr. Bart. He wishes for all students to feel included and comfortable in their school environment. “I hope it becomes more of an inclusive thing,” he says. “Not just for the leaders of the school.”
Contrary to popular belief, staff members like Mr. Bart do not wish to censor and limit the amount of fun Color Day brings but hope to simply expand it. Mr. Bart is trying to stretch Color Day festivities throughout all of Spirit Week.
New challenges began on Wednesday with Pentucket Trivia at all three lunches and the Intertwined Circle after school. Festivities continued on Thursday with Ugly Sweater Day, an eating contest during lunches, and the Dizzy Bat Race after school. On Friday, classes dressed all in neon and competed in Name that Teacher during lunch and a paper airplane contest after school. After recovering from Homecoming on Friday night, students will dress in pajamas and compete in a mobile-device based scavenger hunt after school. On tuesday, a.k.a Class Color Day, Freshmen will dress in all pink, Sophomores will be decked out in complete orange, Juniors will wear an array of red, Seniors will have a black-out, and teachers will dress in all green and all will attend Spirit Night after school. Then, on Wednesday, all students will wear their class t-shirts and share each others videos to compete for the title of Color Day Champs.
In order for everyone to have fun this spirit week, help and participation is needed from all students, of all classes. Meetings open to all students are routinely held by each grade’s class officers. The fate of Color Day depends solely on the amount of participation from each class. Contact class officers for more information on how to get involved in each activity.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krr3a_c8HDs
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yn3qU8FNMls
Vanessa Beauregard • Dec 10, 2013 at 6:08 pm
I was disappointed when I found out that color day wasn’t going to be skits! That’s the whole fun of color day! Seeing people go up on stage and act silly. Although the videos were still good, I definitely liked it way better when there were skits!
Alyssa Mostyn • Dec 6, 2013 at 11:04 am
This was a really interesting article. I had no idea they made that many changes to Color Day.
Sarah Waterhouse • Dec 5, 2013 at 8:53 am
I agree with Lindsey that color day was just not the same this year. Every previous year, color day was so exciting and funny. However, this year, my senior year, I was actually very disappointed. I think we are taking precautions too far. The skits have always been harmless. Maybe some of the jokes seem inappropriate, but that is what makes them funny. Making color day only about censored videos takes away the whole purpose. We hyped up color day so much this year, and it was just a huge let down. I also don’t agree with Bart’s claims of how color day is better because people don’t have to be intimidated by performing in front of the whole school. I think skits gave people who do not participate in things like theater their time to shine. Color day will never be the same as the school’s rules continue to get more strict.
Ryan • Dec 5, 2013 at 8:39 am
This was a very good article! I liked hearing about people’s opinions on the old and new color day.
Brooke • Dec 5, 2013 at 7:56 am
The article was a very detailed and accurate description of Color day. I found I could relate to some of the opinions given about only having videos in Color day.
Carlos Del Castillo • Dec 5, 2013 at 4:22 am
I really think it’s too bad that the skits are gone. I felt so much more involved when watching a skit with actors who could respond to audience feedback. I also couldn’t hear well like I could in past years because the videos can’t wait for the audience to quiet down. I did like the videos this year, just not as much as the skits.
Haley Collins • Dec 4, 2013 at 11:18 pm
This article definitely caught my interest seeing that it is about a topic all of the Pentucket high schoolers have an opinion on. I remember seeing the first lip-dub that inspired the start of videos in color day and it was an awesome video, but they also performed a great live skit. Although it is nice to have the skits fully documented on video so we can watch it more than once, nothing beats the memories we used to make during the live performances of our skits. I know that the freshman class has now never experienced color day the way all of the upper classmen remember it, and that is sad because when we used to be preparing to act in our live skits, the school spirit was much higher. Hopefully this won’t be a permanent change to Pentucket’s color day.
allegra • Dec 4, 2013 at 10:37 pm
not having skits was soo weird and less exciting and funny! however, the videos came out really good. i still think everyone was spirited, involved, and excited, even without the skits. and the challenges this year were great!
Rachel Fowler • Dec 4, 2013 at 9:32 pm
I understand why the teachers wanted to change the color day to videos because the stress could be crazy, but at the same time, looking at this year in comparison to other years, the excitement was just lost. Its the live skits, no matter how bad or crazy they are that bring something to color day
Rebecca Torrisi • Dec 4, 2013 at 9:18 pm
This is very interesting to learn about the past color days and the history in our school
Nate Hey • Dec 4, 2013 at 7:54 pm
I didn’t know the Color Day changing from skits to videos was a plan in the making