At Manhattan High, the fall Homecoming pep rally is a long-held tradition that many MHS students, and some faculty, look forward to.

However, it has become increasingly clear to the student body that with all the laughter, powderpuff cheerleading and various activities, there are some deep flaws and inadequacies with the time — Wednesday morning during advisory time — administration shoves the fall pep rally into.

Pep rallies are meant to pep kids up for the Friday night Homecoming football game (in the winter this is changed to basketball), but ultimately the pep rally does not serve its intended purpose when it is hosted on a Wednesday morning — two days before the actual game.

Students end up returning to the regular school-day after the rally, hyped for Advanced Placement Chemistry, or whichever class they are returning to, rather than the game, diminishing the whole purpose of showing school spirit and supporting the team as a student community for the game.

Not only is the purpose of the pep rally reduced to nothing by hosting it so far ahead of game time, but the purpose of advisory time is whisked away when it is used to benefit the purely the enjoyment of students rather than their academic advancement.

The purpose of advisory is to strengthen a student’s academic knowledge, create a sense of community and prepare a student for post-secondary life. As a school — a place established to serve the purpose of advancing a child in academic knowledge — it is almost foolish to play off a pep rally as community building when there are many students in dire need of academic help. MHS takes pride in the advanced academic achievements of its students, but advisory time — which includes a work time and a flex time that allows for specific student-teacher help — is a vital part of maintaining and achieving that advanced status.

It is the agreement of The Mentor editorial board that while the pep rally is a tradition both loved and indeed wanted and enjoyed by the students of MHS, these fundamentally significant problems with the execution of this long-held tradition must be fixed before the winter pep rally.

Regarding the day and time of the pep rally, it has already been established that Wednesday morning is not necessarily the most convenient or appropriate time to host this event. Switching the schedule so that it would be three regular schedule days, followed by two block schedule days — the regular schedule being Monday, Tuesday, Friday, followed by the block days Thursday, and Wednesday (with the schedule flipped so the advisory becomes the last hour of the day) would work much more conveniently in terms of timeliness. As there was time left over after this past pep rally, this should also provide adequate time for freshmen to make it back to East campus and buses to make it back up to West.

As for the disregard of the true purpose of advisory, this is an easier fix. For students who do not meet the basic academic requirements of MHS, are failing classes or simply wish to use this time to further their learning rather than sit in the gym, the time that the pep rally takes up should instead be used to benefit these students’ academic improvement. If questioning how to execute this, it has been done before for students who did not wish to experience the solar eclipse for various different reasons; it can easily be done again.

The pep rally is a tradition that MHS holds dear in its powderpuff-cheerleading-loving heart, and with a few simple improvements this beloved tradition can become more efficient and enjoyable for all.