The start of football season here at Central Catholic also means the return of many school wide events. One of these events which correlates with the start of football season, is the first pep rally. Each year, student council develops and leads a pep rally the same day as the first varsity football game. In recent years, there has been a cry from the student body for more entertaining, better executed, and simply funnier pep rallies. This cry was answered on Friday, August 30, in the Central Catholic’s historic gym. In the words of student council moderator Coach Nelson, STUCO delivered, “One of the better pep rallies this school had seen in a while”. Many students were also impressed with the outcome, however a vast majority  probably do not realize how much time and effort was exerted by student council into this pep rally. I’m here to give a behind the scenes look into the making, and deliverance of this pep rally. 

At the final Student Council meeting of the 2019 school year, President Franco Alonso assigned each of his members into various work committees. Each of these committees would consist of sophomore and junior representatives with an Executive member at its head. The student council pep rally was led by Executive Vice President David Trevino, with its members being senior Ahsad Tokmehdash, juniors Aidan O’Connell and Francisco Garcia, and sophomore Joseph Spicer. The pep rally committee had all Summer to discuss and brainstorm ideas for the pep rally, and when the school year began, they also began their introductory work on the pep rally. They first emphasized the writing of the annual skit, which takes up around 10-15 minutes of the pep rally, and it is the first time the school sees their new student council in action. When discussing the writing of the skit, Senior Ahsad Tokmehsdash added, “Guys don’t understand how hard it is to write a skit. It’s the little details that make the skit entertaining, and guys don’t understand how hard it is to process and write out the little details.” After writing what they believed was a solid script, the pep rally committee was ready to enter the next step of the pep rally process: Approval.

When seeking approval, the student council must send in their skit idea to Coach Nelson who censors and verifies the skit. After Coach Nelson approved, Executive members Franco Alonso and David Trevino met with Coach, as well as principal Mr. Walswick to read the pep rally and gain another voice of approval. When Mr. Walswick approved, Stuco was ready to plan  the final planning stages of the pep rally, being the introductory roasts, and classic “Top Tens’. These aspects are difficult, but not as difficult as the skit to develop ideas for. After thinking out and planning these two items, Stuco sent a finished copy of the pep rally to Coach Nelson one week before the pep rally, which he acceptingly approved. Student Council was now ready to enter the final stage of the pep rally process: practice/delivery. 

Starting on Monday of pep rally week, the student council members met everyday at 7:00 in the morning in the historic gym to practice the ensuing pep rally. Members were also tasked with gathering any materials needed for either the skit or ‘Top Tens’.  Throughout the week, Senior members made sure to inform any football player, students, or faculty members if they were going to be involved in the pep rally. After 5 morning practices, discussions in the Student Council GroupMe, and the desire to not get booed off the stage at a pep rally (yes, that actually happened last year), Stuco was ready to deliver their first pep rally.

After faculty appearances by Mr. Villapando and Mrs. Sosa, an entertaining skit, a motivational speech by Mr. Bronder, and an attempt to shave a classmates head by starting quarterback Christian Allen, the first pep rally was met with great reception by the faculty and student body of Central Catholic. Starting running back Gibby Garza also had to add, “I thought the pep rally was really funny. It made me laugh and got me even more excited for the opening game.” With this pep rally being a success, the Student Council knows they have a high bar for the Antonian football pep rally, which is the last game of the season. If they follow the same steps as last time, and carry on their creativity from the first pep rally, we should be expecting another entertaining pep rally come the end of the season.