This year’s homecoming theme of Recess revival was filled with nostalgia for current students, alumni, and surrounding community members. Throughout the week, the Simpson College Campus Activities Board (CAB) hosted different games and events that attracted many different groups on campus. The games included a field day, pin the bow tie on President Byers, a lip sync battle, Simon says, hungry hungry hippos, musical chairs, dodgeball, and yell like hell.
On Oct. 16, the Simpson community celebrated the inauguration of the 25th President, Jay Byers.
“Homecoming and inauguration coming together in one event or one week is huge, and so I think that the level of involvement and the excitement and the amount of people that came back for Homecoming just made it really special,” Dean of Students Matt Hansen said.
Along with the special events of the week was the tradition of the homecoming football game. The Simpson Storm football team defeated Nebraska Wesleyan 21-14. In addition to the football game, Simpson’s women’s and men’s soccer teams took the field. Women’s soccer dominated Buena Vista with a 6-0 win, and men’s soccer swept the competition 7-0 — a successful weekend for Simpson Athletics.
“I thought this year’s Homecoming went really well,” Steven Strope, director of student activities, said. “I think anything that we can bring ourselves together as a community, even though there may be competition involved in it, there’s still that Simpson spirit.”
The winner of the Homecoming games this year was TRIO, with a score of 353 points; coming in close second was Women’s Soccer, with a score of 325.5 points. The two groups were new contenders for this year’s games. Soccer captain Hailey Kowzan said, “We got the team started because we thought it would be good team bonding and also a way to get our name out there. I feel like a lot of sports teams don’t participate in Homecoming, and we want to change that.”
Emma Haynes, a member of TRIO, said, “One of TRIO’s missions this year is to increase visibility and recognition on campus. Over 200 students are involved in TRIO, but a lot of people don’t recognize that a lot of students are in TRIO, so we are trying to make ourselves more visible and let people on campus know that we are an organization that not only helps students but lets students have fun and get involved. ”
The winner of the field games was “Black Ops,” with Simpson College Women’s Soccer once again coming in second. Grace Dong of TRIO won the pin the tie contest, women’s soccer won the lip-sync battle, Simon Says winner was Hailey Kowzan of women’s soccer, and once again women’s soccer was on the board with their win in Hungry Hungry Hippos and street painting. TRIO won again in musical chairs and Yell Like Hell. Julia Wagoner was the winner of the Medallion hunt.
“Overall, CAB enjoyed and appreciated everyone’s participation, from the mini-games to the themed days. I hope everyone had a blast and enjoyed the nostalgia,” CAB President Zamaria Barnes said.
