Spirit of Kinkaid Kicks Off School Year

Senior Lexie Heim, sophomore Merritt Cosby, junior Ally Ammons and senior Louise McCartney paint the sign that is placed at the end of senior hall. 

At the start of each school year, students are greeted by personal locker signs, colorful hallway displays and lots and lots of glitter. Each decoration is courtesy of the Spirit of Kinkaid club (SOK), which has been a club since 1974. This year’s theme is the Kingdom of Kinkaid. The girls of SOK worked tirelessly decorating the halls for three weeks to prepare for the first day of school. 

SOK club is made up of presidents, board members and regular members from each grade. The SOK board is made up of five selected members from each grade. There are two selected senior presidents and all members who are not on the board get in on the creative action by joining the club at clubs fair in the second week of the year. 

SOK is responsible for boosting school spirit and encouraging student involvement in school events. They make big signs indicating which hall belongs to which grade, a giant calendar with all the important school events labeled, and the list of rules written in colorful letters that freshman need to follow. Each locker of the school gets a special sign and each SOK board member has worked to make them unique.

Senior Louise McCartney has been on SOK board since her freshman year and is determined to make this year the best yet. “I have probably cut out 200 locker signs and every year we design new signs based on theme, but freshman always get hand decorated fish,” McCartney explains.

Three senior lockers decorated with their custom signs. 

The sophomores received a carriage to allude to their new ability to drive, juniors got a coat of arms to reflect the difficulty of the year to come and seniors were presented with the most prominent symbol of a kingdom: crowns. 

SOK is embracing the Kingdom of Kinkaid theme and while this year's back-to-school decorating is done, they are looking forward to the famous Kinkaid SOK week, which is Oct. 24-28. Each SOK club member will spend the week decorating every inch of the Student Center with paper, glitter, and cut-outs of each Fall varsity sport member in preparation for their games against our biggest rival, St. John's. Using paper and paint the girls will give each varsity Fall sport their own wall and decorate it from top to bottom. By the end of the week, when the room is revealed it is almost unrecognizable. Both SOK week and the first week of school are busy times for the SOK club, but students are excited about his year's theme and look forward to more fun and well decorated events. 

SOK did an amazing job welcoming students back to the high school this year and the club is ready to continue to get the student body excited about events to come.