Students anxiously stood on their tiptoes to watch the Baptist collegiate ministry building and after several minutes of waiting, a huge parade of green and red began streaming down in front of Stubbs Residence Hall and up to the student union patio. Seniors Rachel Fortney and Matt Jones were honored as Mr. and Ms. Oktoberfest. The awards were followed by the Spirit Leader and Klown dance.
Spirit Leaders wear lederhosen with bands of color representing their class, either green or red depending on their graduation year. Spirit leaders are chosen due to their dedication and love for Longwood. Spirit Leaders also have a traditional German dance they perform every year.
Katherine Wilson, one of the Mortar Board representatives for Spirit Leaders, explained, "Spirit Leaders are very important for Oktoberfest because they lift up the spirit of Oktoberfest on campus."
Klowns assemble wacky and tacky outfits that correspond to their class colors. Klowns work together to create a unique dance every year by mashing up a variety of favorite pop songs. They perform a "dance off" in the parade to get both the red class and green class hyped for the day.
Erin Webb, one of the Mortar Board representatives for Klowns, explained, "A Klown is someone selected based on their overwhelming spirit and ability to relay and instill that sprint into others. They are selected in order to help kick off Oktoberfest and pump up the crowd with spirit."
Both Klowns and Spirit Leaders are nominated by members of Mortar Board, then individually selected and invited through a letter and/or email to participate. One student is also chosen by CHI to serve as the CHI Klown.
Senior Nancy McDonald was chosen to serve as the CHI Klown for this year's Oktoberfest. McDonald said, "Being selected to be the CHI Klown this year was such an honor. I could not have been more elated to participate in such an exciting tradition here at Longwood…school spirit is something that I hold near and dear to my heart, and I was thrilled to be selected to help ignite that spirit in others. Plus, who wouldn't want to break it down in an awesome CHI Klown outfit?"
Senior Daniel Yoo served as one of the red class Spirit Leaders. "I was honored to be a Spirit Leader and enjoyed every minute of it. It was definitely a once in a lifetime chance because just thinking that I was chosen out of hundreds of people made me happy," said Yoo.
Junior Gina DeMarco served as a green class Spirit Leader. She explained, "It was such an honor to be chosen to be a Spirit Leader. I really loved meeting the other Spirit Leaders and seeing how different we all are, but how much we all really share a love for Longwood. I was dead tired by the end of the dance, but I would do it all again because it was really a lot of fun."
Senior Holly Smith served as a red class Klown. "Being a KLOWN was so much fun! It was one of my Longwood dreams, and it was such an honor to be part of the small group of people who were selected this year (thanks MoBo!)! I loved getting dressed up in crazy outfits and coming up with our dance—it was such a rush and is definitely one of the top experiences since I've had at Longwood."
Junior Tim Mellon, who served as a green class Klown, explained that the practice for the dance was held at 10 p.m. "Even though I was tired, I always had a blast going. Everyone that did it was goofy and it was just amazing being able to goof off with a bunch of fun people….personally, I was never able to figure out the electric slide and would mess everyone around me up by clapping way to early. It was just little things like that that made practice fun."
Junior Regan Anderson also served as a green class Klown, and found the email offering her the spot to be an unexpected surprise."At our first meeting, I only knew a couple of the other Klowns, but I liked it that way because it meant I would get to meet a lot of new people." Anderson explained that she was nervous during the parade but at the same time she was proud to be a Klown and part of the tradition.
"Obviously on performance day everyone was a bit nervous and you could tell, but everyone was encouraging to each other and then once the anxious feeling wore off everyone was back to being playful and silly," said Mellon.
