This post was contributed by a community member. The views expressed here are the author's own.

Schools

Stevenson Lights Up Spirit Fest, Smashes World Record

In its first nighttime appearance, Stevenson High School's annual Spirit Fest crushed the record for the world's largest glow stick design.

After an evening of music, snacks and soaking teachers in a dunk tank, 826 people arranged on ’s football turf shattered the world record for the largest glow stick design.

With the stadium lights shut off, participants at held up blue glow sticks to form the letters C-A-S-A, an acronym for the nonprofit beneficiary of this year’s event. And after posing for photographic evidence to send to Guinness Book of World Records, the crowd pitched their glow sticks skyward, cheering and dancing to LMFAO’s “Party Rock Anthem.”

This is the second year that the school has broken a world record at Spirit Fest, its annual kickoff to Homecoming week. Last year, 525 attendees . This year’s glow stick design displaced the previous record of 308 participants, achieved in March by the chemistry department at the Université Laval in Quebec.

Find out what's happening in Buffalo Grovewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Organizers estimate that the festival, hosted at Stevenson’s football stadium, attracted about 1,300 people and raised at least $20,000 for Court Appointed Special Advocates (CASA) Lake County, a nonprofit that trains volunteers to advocate for abused or neglected children as they wade through the juvenile court system.

Kevin Rho, a Stevenson senior and director of service for the National Honor Society — the organization that plans Spirit Fest — said he was overwhelmed by the turnout to support CASA. “It shows what kind of community we are, what kind of school we are,” he said.

Find out what's happening in Buffalo Grovewith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Rho and Vivek Magati, secretary for the honor society, spent the good part of an hour atop the announcer’s box above the stadium, arranging the 826 glow stick record participants into their letters. “Hey! The cell phone light in A-one needs to be turned off!” Rho ordered, referring to the first A in the CASA acronym. “S is too far to the right,” he radioed to the letter managers on the field.

But within a few minutes, the troops fell into line and perfected the letter formation. “This is amazing. This is amazing,” Rho and Vivek repeated as the lights went down, high-fiving everyone they could reach.

Later, against the boom of the fireworks, Rho tried to recount what it was like to stand above the field, with a bird’s eye view of his fourth and final Spirit Fest.

“From up there,” he struggled. “I can’t express it through words. It was just simply amazing. It was more than I had even dreamed of.”

Junior Isabella Errigo pointed out, and other students agreed, that changing Spirit Fest to a nighttime event improved attendance, especially among the Stevenson student body. It also allowed the National Honor Society members on the Spirit Fest planning committee to gain approval for fireworks from the Lincolnshire Village Board. Many students named the fireworks as their favorite part of the event, along with the blow-up jousting ring and the 5K stroll around the school.

Earlier in the evening, Laura Shepin and her family talked at a picnic table near one end zone.

“It’s wonderful to see my students outside of class,” said Shepin, a Spanish teacher at Stevenson. “A lot of them helped plan the event, and I knew even more would be here. My students have heard all about my kids, and my kids have heard all about my students, so it’s fun to bring those two worlds together.”

Her son Danny, 5, said the giant, inflatable obstacle course was the best thing at Spirit Fest. Seven-year-old Joey munched on fistfuls of fresh popcorn, thoughtfully trying to pick his favorite part. “The food,” he said with a laugh.

Up the field at the dunk tank, senior Sonia Doshi, president of the National Honor Society, wound up for her attempt to soak Brett Erdmann, the group’s adviser.

“Letter of recommendation, Sonia!” Erdmann taunted. “If you want that letter of recommendation from me, you might want to rethink throwing that ball.”

Erdmann avoided a dunk on Doshi’s pitch, but he hit the water plenty of other times. In addition to being the honor society’s sponsor, he teaches biology and works as the school’s community service coordinator. He’s been advising this year's Spirit Fest committee since March, when the planning process began.

“It just gets better and better,” he said of the festival. “They build upon what happened last year, so that’s the neat thing to see. They always try to introduce something new. They always try to push the limits of what we think kids can do in a high school setting.”

Doshi has also witnessed that change. She’s been coming to Spirit Fest for years, since her brother served as the honor society’s president in 2005. Back then, the event was simply Spirit Walk, a 5K lap around the campus. Now, Doshi said she’s proud of how it has expanded into Spirit Fest.

“I think it all really hit me when they turned the lights off for the world record, and all the glow sticks were up in the air. It was just an incredible sight. It was breathtaking,” she said, trying to find the right words as the music quieted and the party ended. “I’m just in complete awe right now.”

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here

The views expressed in this post are the author's own. Want to post on Patch?