Flashing lights, blaring music, buzzing atmosphere; in short, students are singing, dancing, and having the time of their lives. Tissue paper has been crafted to create trees that make the west gym look straight out of the jungle. But leading up to this “wild night,” there was a whole week of fun themes to build up anticipation.

Berkley High School’s spirit week began on Wednesday, September 21st: the hallways were decorated after school. Each grade decorated their own portion of the hallways with their special colors: white for freshman, green for sophomores, red for juniors, and blue for seniors. Throughout the week, walking down the hallway, it was hard to miss all of the colorful decorations and the atmospheric effect of colored paper over the ceiling lights. People were often seen pushing streamers aside on their way up and down the hallway. One of the most unique decorations was the Mike Wizowski drawing in the sophomore hallway.

Continuing with the fun and festive spirit, students and staff were asked to make a choice of whether they were more of a soccer mom or a BBQ dad and dress accordingly the next day. The BBQ dads tied up their best “kiss the cook” aprons. While the soccer moms dressed in athletic wear, layered with cardigans, and topped their looks off with sunglasses. Everyone had tons of fun dressing as their favorite parenting cliche.

Friday: the classic spirit week theme of “decades.” Each grade had their own decade, 70s (9th), 80s (10th), 90s (11th), and 2000s (12th). And boy did everyone show up and show out! Freshman walked around school in long, flared jeans. The sophomores crimped their hair and put on their most extravagant eye shadow, some even dressed up as their favorite fictional characters from the decade. Various juniors were spotted sporting flannel shirts, elastic chokers, and their best pair of high top converses. And the seniors rocked low rise jeans and bedazzled designs. Being such an easy and popular theme, Friday proved lots of student participation, retro is always in.

Our spirit week took a brief recess for the weekend and Rosh Hashanah and came back swinging with “White Lies Day.” Members of the Berkley High School district decorated white t-shirts with fun little lies about themselves. Many scriptures were inside jokes between students and their friends, others were fibs that everyone could relate to. Statements such as, “I make the first move” and, “I’m a good driver” were seen throughout the halls that day. After school, girls from the Junior and Senior classes had a grueling and aggressive powderpuff game (for more information, read, “Class of 2023 Bags Their Second Powderpuff Win”). With maroon and black paint smeared across their faces, the female students fought as hard as they could. The seniors ended up winning by 6 points, but both grades had bruises and scars to show their dedication. What a way to start the second half of spirit week off with a bang!

Thursday was perhaps the most exciting day of the week. Students had been anticipating “Adam Sandler Day” for some time. This was inarguably one of more unique themes for BHS in particular. This spirit week has been a very interesting one for Berkley, featuring many themes that we haven’t done before. Students (and even some teachers too) put on their baggiest shorts and their best oversized tee to channel the iconic comedian. This day was comfy for everyone involved, and a nice separation from spending time trying to create the perfect look for school.

On Friday, the whole school created an exciting four color rainbow. The freshman strolled down the hallway in white; sophomores rocked various shades of green; the juniors wore nice reds; the seniors marched proudly along the school halls in blue. Later in the school day, the student body was led to Hurley Field by the marching band for our pep assembly (for more detail, read, “Berkley Holds Annual Pep Rally”). The rally included fun games such as Frozen Shirt, the classic Tug of War, and a pie eating contest. To hype up the crowd to the max there were also performances by the marching band, the cheer squad, drumline, dance team, BHS’ show choir, “Encore!”, and of course the National Anthem. Students were released from the pep assembly feeling exhilarated and ready for the upcoming homecoming game.

On Friday night, students and community members returned to Hurley Field for the highly anticipated homecoming game against Royal Oak High School. The stands were packed, pom poms and cowboy hats could be seen from far and wide, BHS students still had their grade colors smeared across their faces in colorful makeup. Fans of the Berkley Bears were cheering for their team, wanting nothing more than for them to come out winners. The cheerleaders pepped up the crowd from the sidelines and led several team cheers, while people in the stands were also working to get everyone else to scream for the Bears. BHS was leading the game from the start, the score being 7 to 0 before halftime. In the halftime portion of the game, the marching band, cheerleaders, and dance team returned to perform their sets again for the crowd. After many stumbles, tackles, and injuries, the game ended with the BHS winning 30 to 7. The crowd erupted in cheers, knowing that their exciting homecoming weekend had started off on the right track. Nothing like an intense rivalry to bring people together (for more detail read, “Bears Eat Birds: Recap of This Year’s Homecoming Game”).

On Saturday night at 7:00, the west gym opened to immerse the students into the depths of the jungle. The vibe was pumping, the DJ had classic party songs blasting from his speaker. Students created dance circles, with various people doing their signature moves in the center for their peers to record and post on social media. The night was alive and certainly not for the faint of heart.

For those who wanted a more quiet, intimate experience, the east gym held a screening of the 2019 blockbuster film “Jumanji: The Next Level”. Which starred big names such as The Rock, Kevin Hart, and Jack Black. After experiencing the truly wild night in the other gym, students came to the movie night to cool off, relaxing themselves before diving back into the intense party scene.

The dance ended with everyone rushing back onto the dance floor for one final song, not wanting the rush the night gave them to end. Students sang and danced with their friends one last time before disbursing and exiting the jungle in favor of the real world. Spirit week had done its job. Everyone was truly hyped up and the night ended on a high note, with everyone going home with smiles on their faces.