Stockbridge Traditions + School Spirit = Panther Pride

Share your Stockbridge school memories

Stockbridge Community Schools has a rich history filled with traditions and school spirit. As each new year begins, we must honor our past and look toward the new opportunities of the school year. We feel that our schools are the heartbeat of our community, and understanding where we have been is essential to navigating where we want to go.

To help honor our past, one of my goals as your superintendent is to reach back and celebrate our graduates and alumni. Our past is our foundation, and our legacy is built by those who walked these halls of our schools before us. When we connect that storied history with our current students, we discover what I hope you will agree is a simple but powerful equation for us to embrace:

Stockbridge Traditions + School Spirit = Panther Pride.

Our traditions set us apart and bind our school community together. Just in case you’re new to our school/community, here are a few examples:

• For many years, a special Homecoming tradition is our Cross Country team running the game ball back from the opposing team’s school and presenting it to the football team at a pep assembly for the Homecoming football game.
• On Halloween, our elementary students dress up and then join together to become one big Halloween Parade. Our families line the sidewalks to celebrate and see the creativity of our students in their costumes.
• For the past few years, we have started two new traditions for our seniors—Senior Sunrise and Senior Sunset—marking the start and end of their last year in our school.
• Seniors in their caps and gowns also now connect with our kindergarteners before they leave, “passing the torch” in the Panther Pass Ceremony at the end of the year.
• Traditions where we honor our students are part of many of our programs, including athletics, grade levels, choir, band, FFA, robotics, and more.

This is only a partial list, and traditions are only half of the equation; the other half is our school spirit. We have many opportunities to share our spirit through events and connections. One fun connection that takes place during Homecoming week is when our high school athletes greet and “pump up” our younger students as those students walk into school. A high five or fist bump generates energy and excitement, fueling our school spirit. If you walk into our high school during Homecoming week, you will see the halls completely transformed and decorated with colorful paper, themed props, and hallway lights covered in orange and black to build excitement. That energy carries directly into our athletic events, where our student section creates themes for each game and then shows up with costumes and school spirit galore! There is also nothing like the earth-shaking roar of the Spirit Jug chant at our pep assemblies, where students yell at the top of their lungs to win the trophy.

The reason for sharing all of this is that many of you are alumni of Stockbridge High School, many of you participated in or even helped create our special traditions, and TOGETHER, we want to fuel more SCHOOL SPIRIT, not only at school, but within our entire community! Go Panthers!

So what’s next?

We want to hear your alumni stories! What traditions made Stockbridge special when you were a student? What school spirit memories, traditions, events, or experiences still stand out to you today? What ideas do you have that could increase our school spirit everywhere?

Whether it’s a Homecoming or Coming Home tradition, a special event, a team tradition, a classroom activity, or something unique to your class or era, we want to hear about your favorite school memory!

Please share your Stockbridge tradition, favorite school memory, or school spirit storyby emailing us at communications@panthernet.net. We hope to share these in our community newsletter you receive three times each year—in the fall, winter, and spring/summer.

We want to build a district where every Panther—past, present, and future—feels a sense of belonging and Panther Pride in their school community. Together, we are writing the next great chapter of our school’s history.

We Are Stockbridge. Go Panthers! Jeff Trapp, Superintendent