Pep Rallies

Once upon a time, in middle-school, in fact, I was a cheerleader.  I made the team.  I used hairspray and cheered the team.  I giggled with girls after school and even was elected co-captain one year.  Then, I grew up and changed.  I decided that I wasn't in to sports. At all.  I decided in the 11th grade to run with a different crowd that wasn't in the spotlight.  I became more interested in music and reading than jocks and scoreboards.  We all change and grow.  We discover who we want to be and how we will be that.
As a teacher, I see my students as diverse as the adults that I encounter every day.  I am baffled, however, that as schools and teachers, we seem to think that each student should be the same.  At our school, a middle school, a pep rally is a reward.  Students are allowed to not wear standard school attire on pep rally day as long as they wear a school t-shirt.  They are allowed to miss class and instruction time, ONLY to go to the pep rally.  There are no other options. If you don't go to the pep rally, it is because you are being punished.  The pep rally is billed as this wonderful event that only if you are good, you get to go to. Problem is that not all students give a flip about booty rap, teachers competing against students in b-ball, and seeing which grade can yell their grade the loudest.  ("Seventh grade, " yell, stomp, repeat.)  Some kids LOVE it.  Some kids find it relatively amusing, and some loathe it. But, as a reward, they all have to go.  And, I have to go.  Pep Rally's are loud and annoying.  The superficial light in the gym combined with the arbitrary yelling is enough to give anyone a headache.  It is nightmarish in many ways.  As a teacher, I have to go, too.  The cool teachers are the ones digging it, boogieing, and showing their school spirit.  A few students asked me for an alternative.  A reading club or a study hall, but this is frowned upon.  Not wanting to attend is an obvious affront to school spirit.  Or maybe, this assumption that we are all the same or should be is ingrained not only in our testing but in our recreation as well.  I love to see my kids having fun and enjoying themselves, but I also clearly see that the kids who seek the alternative should not be incriminated or discriminated against.  Neither should I. Just think what kind of service projects or learning subjects or critical thinking skills we could get in with a group of middle schoolers and a concerned teacher!