Deeply competitive, intensely exciting, thoroughly entertaining, the Early College High School color wars is more than sport, more than a game – it’s a rite of passage.
It’s also loud and fun and just a little crazy.
The Killeen ISD high school that is normally split between an underclassmen campus on Fort Hood and an upperclassmen campus on Central Texas College gathered together Friday in the school gym.
Students came decked out in separate color clothing based on their classes. Many added makeup and accessories and some held signs.
For two hours in the morning, students competed in relays on the gym floor as their peers cheered and yelled encouragement.
Following lunch and a club fair, students continued the games, earning points in an effort to win a trophy and intramural bragging rights.
One contest involved two peers directing a wheeled cart containing a third student using a basket to capture plastic balls at the center of the gym floor.
Another relay called on participants to dive onto an air mattress and propel it along the gym floor like a sled on a snow-covered slope.
Teachers served as coaches picking participants in each game and guiding the activity along with staff members serving as referees.
Senior Mia Curley explained the color wars tradition as a combination of competition between the classes and time to socialize among students that are usually divided on separate campuses.
“We don’t have sports, but it’s still important to have spirit,” she said. “We can use our voices and be loud. I think it’s more fun than going to a game.”
“We want to win so bad. We want to be the best seniors,” she said, “but whether we win or lose, I’m fine either way. I like hanging out with my friends.”
The demand of finishing high school and two years of college, in addition to having a job makes social time at school especially fun, she said. “It’s a nice unwinding time.”
Teacher Terrell Scribner, in his fifth year at the school, has taught every grade level at Early College and after coaching the juniors last year was recruited by the seniors to follow them up to coach them again.
He agreed that the color wars are an important tradition and said the students and the faculty get into the spirit of the competition.
“Since we don’t have sports, this is a competition we have among the classes,” he said.
Competitions take place every nine-week grading period and include traditional sports like soccer and basketball, as well as powder puff football and other games, as well as the wacky relays.
“It’s fiercely competitive. There are great rivalries among the classes. It is also a let out for the rigorous academic work these students are doing. This is a physical and a mental release. They can rep their classes and have fun.”
The winner gets a trophy and bragging rights for at least nine weeks.
Photo gallery: https://www.flickr.com/photos/killeenisd/albums/72177720328539307/