How To Organize A Successful Pep Rally

Rancho Cucamonga High School puts on phenomenal rallies. A major part of their success comes from how they plan and organize rallies. Their activities director, MJ, has created a system that provides solid structure to the rally organization process amidst all the chaos. They break their rally organization into three parts: Do, Doing, and Done. The first step of the process is breaking the students into groups. For example, one group is placed in charge of decorations / set designs, another group is in charge of writing the rally script, another group is in charge of coordinating the music, another group is in charge of the rally games / competitions, and another group is in charge of the spirit activities, such as class yells or making class flags.

DO:

Each group brainstorms and comes up with a laundry list of the things their group must do. They write each specific “to do” item on an individual post-it. Each group is given their distinct colored post-its to help with the organization. They then place their post-its on the “to do” section of the whiteboard.

DOING:

Once students start actively working on a portion of their groups “to do” list they move their post-it from the “to-do” part of the board to the “doing” part of the board. This allows the advisor and the class to see exactly what is being worked on.

DONE:

Once students have completed a task, they move their post-it from the “doing” portion of the whiteboard to the “done” section. This allows the students and advisor to monitor how they are doing at meeting the often-stressful time frames associated with rallies.

After students have completed all of their group’s tasks and have successfully moved all of their post-its to the “done” section of the whiteboard, they then proceed to conduct a thorough walkthrough of their rally. The walkthrough involves a number of things: practicing the script, trying the games / competitions, decorating the gym, and anything else that needs to be done during the final stages. A walkthrough allows the opportunity to avoid many pitfalls before they occur. However, even the best-planned rally can still have some unexpected setbacks so it is important to plan properly for these setbacks.

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