As the school year fades into October and students settle into their classes, NDB’s student and staffulty leaders prepare for all of the spirit activities that come during the Halloween season. The community looks forward to celebrating the annual fall Spirit Week, Link-O-Ween, Dingbat Rally and of course, Halloween.

Monday, October 24 through Friday, October 28 is Spirit Week at NDB, and students will be allowed to dress up according to daily themes decided upon by ASB. On the Monday following, October 31, students will dress up in Halloween costumes in observance of the holiday. The day will close with NDB’s annual Dingbat Rally, filled with games, cheering and surprises.

“They can expect it to be similar to the Welcome Back rally but more themed for Halloween,” said ASB Spirit Director Zeina Zumot. “They [should] just come with a lot of spirit.”

In the past, themes have been split into subcategories – either assigned to sister classes, upperclassmen versus lower classmen or an open choice. This year, the themes are Barbeque Dads vs. Soccer Moms on Monday, Babies vs. Boomers on Tuesday, Class Colors on Wednesday, Celebrity Day on Thursday and 80’s Neon on Friday. Preparations for the week began long before the announcement of the themes.

Recent developments with disciplinary measures at NDB have complicated Spirit Week, as the first two days were revoked until students were able to improve respect for the school space.

“I’m super frustrated knowing all of the anticipation and work that went into making these spirit days possible,” said ASB Activities Director Caitlynn Reynolds.

However, with students motivated to regain their spirit days, behavior improved and Spirit Week is back on. Other activities planned for Spirit W

eek include the annual school Halloween competitions – a pumpkin carving contest, a costume contest and a baking contest. Each competition, which takes place on a different day of the week, is split into categories such as “tastiest” for the baking competition and “best staffulty costume” for the costume contest. Spirit points are awarded to the winners’ classes, and winners are decided by ASB.

Outside of ASB, students are gearing up for spirit days in hopes of winning contests and spirit points for their classes.

“I am excited about getting to dress up with my friends and have a fun thing to do,” said sophomore Annie Stump. “My favorite part [from last year] was definitely how fun everybody made it. And how cute all the pictures were.”

The staffulty has historically played a major role in Halloween festivities, serving as secret judges for competitions, occasional rally participants and competitors in the staffulty costume contest, in which departments go head-to-head in a group contest.

“We usually have a department group theme costume,” said Isabelle Haithcox, science teacher. “We haven’t settled on ours yet, but we’re working on it slowly.”

For now, preparations continue in hopes of creating the best Halloween activities to date.