By Callia Gilligan and Caris Mann, ’22
Staff Writers
The 2021 Spirit Week has come and gone with great success! Thanks to the hard work of the Student Council, students were able to enjoy a great series of events Oct. 18-22, leading up to the traditional Friday night Homecoming football game!
Spirit Week started off strong with America Monday. Freshmen to seniors could be found decked out in their red, white and blue. It was a great indicator of the participation that would come throughout the week!
This year’s Tuesday theme was Hawaiian Day, and students certainly did not disappoint! Despite the cold weather, it was a tropical climate inside the school with Hawaiin shirts and leis.
On Wednesday, HHS took a trip out west with our Western Wednesday! Hanover saw many cowboy hats, boots, lassos and sheriffs arrive, transforming students into cowboys! A new theme for this year, Western Wednesday had some of the highest numbers of participants for the week.
Stay gold HHS! Thursday’s theme was Outsiders’ Day where students could dress up as either a Greaser or a Soc from S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders. Everywhere you looked, students were dressed in leather and jean jackets, bandanas, and even some letterman jackets for Soc representation. This was another new theme that the Student Council tried out this year with the belief that it connected everybody since it was required reading for all students at Hanover Middle School.
Blue, black, white, and yellow were the only colors seen in school on Friday for the traditional Class Color Day. After a vote taken among teachers, the senior class was awarded the prize for most school spirit and best class representation.
Continuing with Homecoming Week tradition, HHS had its annual pod decorating contest on Friday. Each class decorated a hallway of the school in the theme selected by their class representatives. The freshmen went with a baseball theme as “Fenway Freshmen.” decorating with bases, baseballs and their very own Green Monster! The sophomore class delighted as “Spaced-Out Sophomores” with astronauts and aliens covering the hallway. They even added the special touch of writing the names of the members of the Class of 2024 on golden stars. The juniors took us to the tropics with their Jungle Juniors theme. Monkeys and parrots could be found hanging from the ceiling with an abundance of green leaves covering the hallway. Finally the senior class stayed in true October fashion and decorated the senior pod as “Spooky Seniors.” The hallway was filled with Halloween decorations and was reminiscent of a haunted house. While all classes certainly did a great job, the Seniors ultimately took the win for this year’s pod decoration contest.
The Spirit Week Pep Rally, cancelled in 2020 because of COVID, made its triumphant return on Friday. This year, the rally was held outside on the turf as opposed to being in the gym. It was a fun alternative and a lot of students were fans of the change. Before the rally, the senior class gathered in the courtyard and listened to Taylor Swift’s Lovestory before running onto the turf. After the senior class made its debut, the Student Council E-board announced that the seniors had swept the Pod Decorating Contest and Most School Spirit prizes, as well as the award for the loudest cheer during the rally. Then the games began with the rock-paper-scissors hula hoop game where the underclassmen beat the upperclassmen. Next up was a new game, Dizzy Bat Penalty Kicks, where students had to spin around ten times in a circle and try to kick a soccer ball into a net guarded by varsity soccer goalies Mia Pongratz and Garrett Arnold. It was hilarious to watch when people would either fall or miss the goal entirely. The next game was dodgeball with the senior and sophomore classes vs the junior and freshmen classes. The seniors and sophomores took home the win. The final game was students vs teachers tug of war with the students ultimately winning in the end. The pep rally was a lot of fun this year with new games and excited participants.
The excitement of Spirit Week carried over into Friday’s Homecoming game against Pembroke. Band, cheerleading and football seniors were recognized for their sustained dedication over the last four years. Students continued to show their school spirit and came to the game dressed in all white. At halftime, seniors Danielle Tilden and Nick Plahn were crowned Homecoming King and Queen. The football team beat Pembroke 42 to 15 and the team celebrated with the singing of “Hey Baby.” It was an excellent game and a great end to Homecoming Week!
It had been over a year since HHS saw a Spirit Week and a Pep Rally. Overall, the week was a success with lots of participation to celebrate school spirit. Until next year!
Photos from Homecoming game and dance by Mr. Ryerson
The Hawk 
I enjoyed this article! Not only is it well written and entertaining, it is also very informative!
Ms. Wade
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I love this article. I think it portrays our school spirit in a wonderful way. I think that the writer did an amazing job explaining what spirit day was like. It was very well put together. Overall a really good job.
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This was a really good article! I really liked the addition of the slideshow of pictures. This was very informative and well written. I enjoyed reading it!
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I enjoyed reading this article as it goes into great detail about spirit week at HHS. If I had never attended a spirit week at HHS, this article would have made me feel like I lived through the whole thing. I also enjoyed looking at the photos; it is nice to see everyone’s participation in spirit week. I like the amount of detail put into describing the events of the pep rally as well. Overall, I think this article does a great job recapping our school’s spirit week.
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I think Spirit Week was a week that every HHS student can look back on every year and look forward to next year, especially since it was an event that was cancelled due to COVID. The pep rally day was one of my favorite days as an HHS student so far, I haven’t felt that much excitement with this big of a group of people in what feels like years. I want to know more about the changes that they will make for the themed days for next year, since it was hard to find some of the items for the themes this year. Hopefully the spirit week for next year will be the best one yet.
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I really enjoyed the way the people wrote this article. They made it sound very professional. They had lots of details from spirit week. I really liked this.
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Spirit Week did have great success this year in 2021. A lot of participation from every grade contributed to a great spirit day. I do agree with the fact that the pep rally being held outside in the gym was a fun alternative compared to having none at all. Overall I believe Spirit Week was fun, and successful this year. Great article.
Joey Montoya
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I really enjoyed this article and thought it was a great reflection of spirit week this year. This article sounded very professional and was informative. The photos were a good addition to the article and it helps demonstrate what spirit week is like here at HHS. Overall, I thought this was a great article about spirit week.
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This article was very well written and captured the “spirit” of Spirit Week. Spirit Week is definitely my favorite week in October and this article did a great job at showing why. The entire school was so involved this year and it gave me a sense of normalcy that I haven’t recognized since before Covid. This article will be great to return to in the following years to remember the excitement of Spirit Week.
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I love this article as it gives a very vivid description of our school and spirit week. I too participated in spirit week and found it to be very fun and I enjoyed it very much. My favorite part about the article was the description of the pep rally. I haven’t participated in the pep rally since my freshman year so this year it was awesome and reading about it was awesome.
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I think this article is very well written and encaptures the essence of spirit week at HHS. Spirit week is such an important and fun week for everyone and I loved reading about everything we did. This article is great to look back on in the future to be reminded of the amazing week we had. I especially like the addition of all the pictures because it shows the spirit you are mentioning. I agree that this spirit week and pep rally was one to remember!
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What I liked about this was the pictures it included. Me and my friends were also in some of the pictures. I also liked how they included a brief description of the event that took place. The pictures provided a look into what happened and was going on and I thought it was cool.
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In the article in “The Hawk”called “Spirit Week unities classes in fun events Friendly competition” was very interesting. I liked how it described the whole week, and gave pictures. All HHS students dressed up and it was such a fun week for everyone. From dressing up to ending with an outdoor pep really was super fun, Although would’ve loved for the pep rally to be in gym the whole week was still super exciting and fun!
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I thought this article was written with great detail and enthusiasm, allowing me to relive the amazing week. It had such an enthusiastic tone that anyone would enjoy reading it, and the enthusiasm helps exemplify the great memories of spirit week. The writer had such a positive outlook on the experience, which is so convincing that it’s almost impossible to look back on that week negatively.
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This article was fun and enjoyable to read. It gave many details about each day and the theme of that day. The pictures included were also a really good addition. If someone who had never been a part of spirit week this shows a really good example of it.
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First of all, the tone of this is really warm and informative. In the beginning, when the spirit days were summarized, it was descriptive and created a wonderful image of that week. It was nice to also hear about the Seniors gathering in the courtyard in that detail, seeing that side of the story fits in with an overall fun day. This was a fun read, keep up the amazing work!
-Jake Faghan
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This article was really well written. I don’t usually like reading articles like this but you guys did a really good job of keeping it concise enough that I was still engaged while reading it. You guys gave a lot of good details that made it funny and relatable to read. Overall, this was a very positive overview of the week and was fun to think back on how fun the week really was!
-Sydney Patch
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I enjoy this article because it does a good job at summing up how spirit week went at the high school. I also like how it showed many pictures throughout the week so you can look back at it. The article also talks about all the different themes that each grade chose, which I think is important to know. The article finishes off with saying the score of the homecoming football game in case some people might’ve missed it. Overall it was very informative and tells the reader everything there is to know about spirit week.
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The cover picture of this article drew me in as my beautiful “clase de AP Español” bears the cover. The article itself was very engaging, easy to follow, and relevant to us student readers which is much appreciated. I loved the incorporation of student photographs, and I also think is a smart strategic move as people will come to read the article based upon the pictures of spirit week, similarly to how I was drawn in by the cover. I genuinely see a future in journalism based upon photography as well as strong, fluent writing. Well done to all involved!
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I enjoyed reading this article about spirit day! This article really encompassed the great energy the day brought. The article also mentioned all of the details of the week so I enjoyed that too. I enjoyed how you included pictures of the day as well.
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This article is written very well. I love the tone and positive effect it gave. The details about each day were well written too. I had lots of fun participating in the week and enjoyed the pep rally. Because of covid, we never had one and never knew what to expect. This captures everything well, especially the great week.
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This week for the school is always a great annual event that marks the start of the high school year. Specifically, they mentioned the return of the pep rally after a year of COVID which I think really brought the school together. Also, having the themes all week was fun for all students and people really enjoyed dressing up as cowboys and greasers throughout the week. Spirit week is always a good time but this year was different because it was the first real spirit week in 2 years which was very beneficial for the students.
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I really enjoyed this article, it really encaptured the spirit and excitement that the students put into spirit week. Also, having pictures of the students dressed up in their spirit day outfits was a really nice touch too. In addition to just going over each of the days and the events that occurred this week, I liked that the authors added how the spirits were really high that week especially because we weren’t able to have a normal spirit week last year. All in all I really liked the article and it is great to keep the memories of that special week so people can look back on it in the future.
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Amazing job Callia and Caris! I especially enjoyed the great amount of detail of the events, and it made me feel like I was reliving spirit week. It is very informative, but also was very well written!
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I thoroughly enjoyed this article, it was extremely well written and gave great details about spirit week at HHS. This article was very informative as it went spoke about each specific day during spirit week, as well as explained the festivities of the homecoming football game. I also loved the pictures included. Overall, this was very well written.
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I really enjoyed this article! I also believe student participation in the themed days certainly helped this years spirit week be successful. The writing was very well done, and it really showed how much effort actually goes into making this exciting week of fun possible. I liked how you included photos from all of the events, like homecoming and the football game. It overall just contains the true spirit we have here at HHS. Very well done.
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I love the way this article was written! There were so many great details that made the article so much more interesting and fun to read. I really liked the addition of the pictures, they did a good job at representing the whole school participating in spirit week.
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I loved this article. I think that you guys did a really good job explaining Spirit Week traditions through both the writing and pictures. After the pandemic it was great to get back to normal and you guys captured the excitement really well. Not only did you guys do great explaining Spirit Week but also the memories from the football game and crowning of the king and queen. I love the pictures from Homecoming too even though it was a bust.
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I enjoyed reading this article and it was very interesting. Spirit week was a very inclusive week for everyone and everyone participated. I like how there were pictures added and it shows the school spirit at HHS. Everyone dressed up and it was fun week for everyone. This article is very formative and gave detailed explanations of each activity. Overall, this article is very well written.
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I really enjoyed this article, it was such a fun week! I was so excited to participate in it. I liked how you went into a lot of details about each sprite day. I enjoyed looking at the pictures you included. This is overall an amazing article.
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I really liked this article about Spirit Day! It was very well written and informative! I enjoyed seeing the pictures that displayed the different themes of the week.
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I really enjoyed reading this article. I thought it was very well written and went into great detail about spirit week at HHS. I thought the photos attached to the article were a nice touch and clearly showed what spirit week festivities at Hanover High School looks like. I also enjoyed how the article went into detail about each of the spirit week days, including Western Wednesday and Outsiders day. Overall, this article was very well written and descriptive.
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While reading this article, I greatly enjoyed seeing the “laundry list” of activities that occurred during Spirit Week. Also, I think it is great that the writing includes extracurricular activities, too, such as the football game against Pembroke High School. However, I would suggest adding more visuals and pictures relating to the colors that each class had worn during this week, as it could give the reader a great description of how students and the school looked during such an exciting time
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I found this article really enjoyable to read. Being apart of organizing spirit week myself, seeing a recap of the awesome events planned was really well done. The article was engaging and overall very easy to read by writing in order of the days that happened. I really liked all the pictures used to show the school decorated and students dressed up for spirit days and homecoming. In all, I really think this article provided a sense of normalcy that our school definitely needed.
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I am glad that we were able to have Spirit week this year. It’s honestly a great way for us as students to enjoy the time that we have as students and I agree that everyone especially the seniors went all out. I’m also seeing how interesting it is that COVID has brought everyone closer together and maybe it is something you can write about. With the football game, Spirit week and then Spirit day, I hope this is a way that we as students can look back and see that COVID can’t ruin everything.
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“The Hawk” reviews HHS’s spirit week with a great sense of enthusiasm and success. The day-by-day inside look of spirit week includes details of the accomplishments of each theme, which encourages students to keep reading. Not only did the exciting writing keep it interested, but the picture count reaching over 40 was a great way to get a countless amount of students involved. Although overall the article was wonderful in numerous ways, the best part specifically was when the writers chose to mention the difference between last year and this year; how the students of HHS overcame Covid.
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I really enjoyed this article reflecting on spirit week 2021 at HHS. Spirit week is a very fun and exciting week for all grades in the high school and I believe this article demonstrated that. The slideshow of pictures includes people from every grade and how much fun everyone was having really showed through the photos. The article gave a very detailed description of every theme and activity we do during spirit week. This article shows that although it might not of been a normal spirit week because of covid, all grades and people still made the most out of the week and had as much fun as possible.
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I really liked this article, I thought it was a great representation of what spirit week was like this year! I liked how much detail was given about how everything looked on each day of the week, and what everyone was wearing. The pictures helped to show the excitement this week brought, and how much fun it was for people to participate. This was very well written and helped to show what spirit week is like at HHS.
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I really enjoyed this article! It was a great description of what spirit day at HHS was like. I liked the descriptions of each of the spirit week days, as well as the pictures to go along with it to show what the festivities looked like. Overall, this was a very informative article!
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This was a great article that really encapsulated the events and energy of Spirit Week! This year’s Spirit Week and Homecoming game was an exciting return after not having either in 2020, and turned out to be a great week. I loved the addition of the photos in this article, which give a glimpse into some of the great participation in every day’s themes. Overall a great article that was well written and informative!
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