Homecoming 2020 cancelled

 

March 3, 2021



The 2020 homecoming, which was postponed to this year due to last year’s Covid lockdowns, has been cancelled entirely. Michelle Danruther, speaking on behalf of the Homecoming Committee explained: “We had planned on it being in the third week in June 2020. But because of Covid, we thought we would send it on a year. Now, we’ve cancelled it.”

Michelle explained last year’s decision to postpone the event to this year. “Beginning or middle of March is when you started hearing things were being cancelled. We had been at the school running off our registration forms, getting ready to send them out. In the middle of March, we decided to wait until the middle of April to send them out, just to see where this virus was going, what exactly was going to happen with it. So we just sat on those and didn’t send them out. Then by the middle of April, it became pretty obvious that we were not gonna be able to have it last summer. We tried to turn it into 2020 plus 1.”

This year, the committee began to evaluate the feasibility of doing the postponed event, beginning with a decision regarding the deadline for making a decision: “What is the latest date that we have to make a decision? What’s the latest date that you can still get it pulled off and people contacted?” Ultimately the committee decided that mid-February would be the deadline based on a handful of considerations, including: the need to contact town Alumni, allowing time for registrations, getting commitments from bands, setting up catering for events, etc. From there, “A couple of committee members checked with state and local government and of course the federal laws. We went over all those facts and looked at what we would have to do if we were going to hold a large gathering… Our state and local government were saying ‘You need to follow CDC guidelines.’”

Ultimately, it was a mix of the uncertainty regarding attendance given the fact that many people are uncomfortable traveling during the pandemic and the difficulty of properly implementing CDC guidelines that made it necessary to cancel. “Contact tracing, washing port-a-potties every 2 hours, setting up hand washing stations everywhere… It was just too much to make it work, especially if the weather was bad. The regulations, not knowing what the turnout would look like, and the unpredictable weather… it’s hard to say: ‘Oh let’s just not do it.’ Also we realized it’s hard to say “Let’s do it” and have only, who-knows-how-many people come. And you don’t even know how to prepare for that. If we have it, we’d have to not take late registrations, like for the food. We’re going to have to know a month out so she (the caterer) can prepare x number of meals. We’re going to have to have drive through pickup. We’re not going to be able to have the program in the gym because that packs people into one area. What if the weather is bad and you do have to pack into the gym? It’s great if it’s all outside. Those were all things that went into our thinking.”

Michelle explained that she was not aware of Homecoming being cancelled ever before, at least since 1975 which is her earliest recollection. The committee was hesitant to cancel for a variety of reasons: ”This is once every five years. This is how I look at it - it’s a shot in the arm for our community and a lot of the businesses in the community. Of course the reason we really wanted to do it, it’s a community pride event. Everybody spiffs everything up, tears down old buildings, paints fences, and those are good things for our community. It’s also good to see the school work with the Rotary work with City Council work with main street businesses. That’s sort of a fun thing. So, it was hard. It was hard just to say ‘Hey we can’t postpone this another year. So what we’re going to do is cancel it.’”

Even though the larger events have been cancelled, there will still be some elements of homecoming taking place later this year. “We’re going to print books, a memory book. Basically, we are going to cut back on the number we print and first people who say they want it, it’s going to be available for a donation of any amount. We’re not going to stick a price tag on it. That’s what we’re going to do. We’re working on having a little bit of the program on video so that we can post it on Facebook and on our website. Our program was going to be focusing on heroes, which meant certain people sent in testimonies of ‘So-and-so is my hero because…’ or ’In high school, this person was my hero because…’ We have a few of those and we’re just going to try to put those together for an abbreviated program that can be done virtually. That’s the two things that are still going to happen.”

Information for book ordering and video elements of the program will be posted on the Homecoming Facebook page and website.

 
 

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