Hundreds of students lined the Robert M. Smith Student Center at common hour on Tuesday for the University Program Board’s (UPB) Homecoming Kick-Off Event.
Homecoming week is here again at Slippery Rock University as The Rock prepares to meet Seton Hill on Saturday. All throughout the week, students showed their school spirit as they do every year by wearing green and white.
This year, the UPB kicked off the festivities not with footballs, but with plush dolls. The event, held in the Student Center’s ballroom, featured music and activities that allowed students to showcase their creative sides. Among the activities was a “Stuff-A-Plush” station, a place where students could create and customize their very own stuffed bear, zebra or lion, in a similar manner to a Build-A-Bear Workshop.
The event also featured a T-shirt making station where students could create and customize their own “Keep Calm and…” shirts. “Keep Calm and Rock On” was one of the more popular slogans. All throughout the day, students could be seen wearing their new shirts and carrying their plush dolls.
For those students who may have missed the UPB’s Kickoff Event, the festivities will not end there. The Aebersold Recreation Center (ARC) will host a pep rally on Friday evening starting at 8 p.m.
The event will feature the announcement of the 2014 Homecoming Court as well as appearances by the Slippery Rock cheerleading squad, The Marching Pride, and the football team. The event will conclude with fireworks in the quad.
“The pep rally should be fun,” freshman exercise science major, Christa Iams, said. “I’m looking forward to it.”
The festivities will resume in full force Saturday morning, beginning with the Homecoming parade on Main Street starting at 10 a.m. The parade will feature floats from dozens of university organizations, including the various fraternities and sororities on campus. The parade will march up Main Street and conclude at Mihalik-Thompson Stadium where the Alumni Association will have a Pre-Game Tent that is open to all Slippery Rock Alumni from 11 a.m. to the start of the game at 2 p.m.
“I’m looking forward to the game the most,” Sarah Blosser, a freshman psychology major, said.
At the end of the game, the Alumni Association will host a fifth quarter party that is also open to all Slippery Rock Alumni. There will also be a Golden Grads Club Dinner for the 50-year Golden Grads in the Student Center Ballroom starting at 6 p.m. Also, beginning at 4:30 p.m., the History Department will host a dinner at the Old Stone House that will end at 6 p.m.
The final event for the 2014 Homecoming Weekend will be on Sunday. UPB will be taking a bus of student volunteers to the Pittsburgh Great Race at Point State Park. The bus will depart from the university at 6:30 a.m. and once there, students will work the water stations placed on the race’s route, and will distribute water to the runners.
“It’s a great event,” said Ryan Logue, a junior education major and UPB’s Director of University Events, “It will be fun.”
