Student Life

Living for the weekend: Friday Wavers club celebrates end of week

Decked out in themed outfits, holding up signs reading ‘Honk if you love Fridays’ and shouting at the top of their lungs, the members of Friday Wavers are not simply a random collection of boisterous high school students. The club meets outside of the school at 7 a.m. every Friday to pump up students for the end of the week.

Club president, now a senior Carter Smith said as a freshman he had his doubts about the club.

“I didn’t know how they [waved] without being embarrassed, but once you do it, it’s the most fun thing to do,” Smith said. “You don’t really care about what people think because you’re changing the start of their day and that’s a really good feeling. As I got more comfortable in high school, I decided to try new things and a lot of my friends were doing it so I just decided to [become] involved.”

Although Smith felt reservations about joining the club, he said that it became something he looks forward to during the week.

“I know that everyone who [waves] loves it because it’s just a lot of fun to do,” he said. “Whenever we wear the costumes for the rest of the day, [the other students] always [have] good spirits and seem to respond well to it.”

Senior Bethina Campbell said she also noticed a change in peoples’ mood because of the Friday Wavers.

“Usually in the morning everyone [feels worn-out] and having that jolt of energy helps you push through the rest of the week because it’s Friday [and] we only have one day left until the weekend,” Campbell said. “A lot of people come up to me [and] they’re like ‘thanks for saying happy Friday’ or ‘thanks for waving’. They seem to be a lot more awake and [I know] it’s my doing.”

According to Smith, Friday Wavers have been recognized by students and principals alike.

“At one point last year Mr. Kirk came and [spoke] to us and said even if [the students] might feel embarrassed by us or even if they do like it, he feels that we are making a difference on how the kids feel when they do come to school on Friday,” Smith said. “[Being noticed by him was] a really cool feeling.”

According to sophomore Laura Mafla, Friday Wavers have many ways to cheer people up on Friday mornings including themes, signs and chants.

“We have a theme every week and so we kind of do chants toward that theme,” Mafla said. “We do a wave where we line up and our leader runs past us and we do a wave kind of like Collins Crew does. We do bridges when [students] come out of the car and they go under the bridges. The main thing is that we have huge signs that say honk and so we get all the cars to honk.”

In addition to adding cheers similar to Collins Crew, members of Collins Crew have become involved in the Friday Wavers.

“On the waiver that you sign to be in [Friday Wavers], it says ‘promotes enthusiasm on Fridays and also school spirit’, and since Collins Crew is the school spirit club they thought that it would be cool if Collins Crew and the Friday Wavers were to join forces and wave on Fridays,” Campbell said. Collins Crew and Friday Wavers sponsor, English teacher Amber Wallace said the club allows students to share school spirit in a great way.

“We have kids from each organization playing a part in the Friday Wavers club,” Wallace said. “These kids are all very involved in the school and care about promoting spirit throughout the community. It’s a great way for kids from all different backgrounds to get together and share in school pride.”

Members of Friday Wavers, like Smith, hope to include more new members than just those in Collins Crew.

“[Friday Wavers has] always been more of a theater organization,” Smith said. “Those are the people that founded it and are generally the people that make it up, and so it’s always just kind of stayed in the department. This year I have included some members that weren’t in theater or even Collins Crew to come in just to try to make it a bigger crowd.”

Campbell also said she wants the club to grow but understands why people do not want to join.

“It’s so early in the morning that’s one of the drawbacks of the club,” Campbell said. “I just hope a lot more people come because I feel that everybody can be happy in the mornings and it’s just a real easy thing to do.”