Where’s the School Spirit?

I grew up watching raucous college students chant obscenities at basketball games on TV  and promotional YouTube videos advertise college as a non-stop festival, yet when I walk around campus it seems like Loyola students lack the spirit of past generations.

After 5 p.m., the Lake Shore Campus becomes a ghost town. Students filter into the Halas Recreation Center, the various dining halls or an afternoon class, but the essence of Loyola disappears.

Loyola needs to have more spirit — to wake itself up — not only for current students but also for prospective students and alumni. Loyola should truly feel like a lifelong presence instead of a four-year experience. To have spirit requires a foundation of care among staff and students.

I recently checked LUCommunity despite being a third-year student and saw clubs I had never even heard of —  everything from a Future Underwater Basket Weavers of America Association to a Mayan Revival Architecture Appreciation club. For every true club composed of devoted students, two others sound like money laundering schemes.

The experience of attending a new club meeting is always the same. I approach a club expecting a harmony of voices and a fun sense of community, but when I enter the room, I invariably feel like I’m intruding on a confession. 

There are rarely more than three people at club meetings — two on the e-board, and a third who’s usually the club president’s roommate, childhood neighbor or cousin. Most of these meetings feel closer to an estranged family reunion than a student-led discussion on pressing club affairs.

Although clubs are advertised as social outlets, in my experience it seems students are only attending when there’s a material incentive.

Even our sports teams aren’t immune from this seeming lack of spirit. I love our basketball teams, but I’m not sure I would’ve naturally attended a women’s basketball game they were predicted to lose if the university wasn’t handing out Raising Cane’s Box Combos to the first 100 attendees. 

It’d be better if students participated in school events out of genuine interest rather than for some self-serving reason, but many of the fliers and emails advertise the prize for showing up just as much as the events themselves. 

But it’s important to look at the root of the problem as well. What’s the cause of this spirit deficit? 

The pandemic may be a large contributor. A majority of Loyola students were still in high school when COVID-19 measures were in full effect, and many likely felt the impact of ordered isolation. 

Disruption in routine can be disastrous in a time of great social and mental change, according to a 2021 MDPI study, especially for adolescents. Today’s college students have become more accustomed to being alone or in small groups thanks to the pandemic. For a couple of years, expanding their social networks wasn’t an option.

To reverse the course of the affected youth, Loyola and its students need to work harder to cultivate some sort of soul on campus.

This isn’t to say Loyola is wholly behind in this field — we still have events like Finals Breakfast and the Water Tower Campus Block Party — but more can still be accomplished.

Preserving a strong student culture requires keeping interesting traditions while also forming new events around current fashions. 

Loyola has a noble history of service and environmental stewardship, but our formal tradition is walking through some otherwise inaccessible green doors at graduation. Maybe it’s time for more annual traditions.

On the last day of spring finals, we could light a bonfire on the West Quad and give everyone a chance to throw one of their hundred-dollar textbooks into the flames. If the university demands a safer option, students could start throwing their homework into Lake Michigan.

On second thought, burning books and polluting one of the Great Lakes might not be the best idea.

Perhaps during welcome week, the entire first-year class could walk the lakefront trail from the Lake Shore Campus to the Water Tower Campus. Madonna Della Strada Chapel’s bell can ring after every three-pointer to remind every student about ongoing basketball games. 

Loyola was founded over 150 years ago, yet neighboring universities have supplanted us in tradition. 

Northwestern University students have guarded and painted symbols on a rock since the ‘40s, Depaul University organizes a concert on their quad every spring and The University of Chicago has “houses” — unique residence halls with mascots that compete against each other.

Some of these activities were created by university administration, such as the UChicago’s houses and Depaul’s FEST concert, but the Northwestern tradition of painting the rock was started, and has been upheld, by their student body for decades.

It’s up to the Center for Student Engagement and us students to bring us out of this post-COVID rut — it worked for other schools.

School spirit isn’t about sporting the maroon and gold LUC scarf — it’s about showing up for the community. So remember to do your part. Create a tradition, go to a club meeting, let everyone hear your voice at a game — and if free food happens to be involved, even better.