After evaluating how to better bring the freshmen class together, this year’s Link Crew organized a competition called The Freshmen Cup, which takes place during homeroom. These games are held about once a month in the Great Hall as a place for collaboration and interaction among freshmen.

Link crew comes up with ideas for each competition to include every student. These games create a level of competition to engage everyone. “We bring the freshmen homerooms into the Great Hall or other places around the school to compete in contests. We keep track throughout the year, and we give them points based on who wins. And then at the end of the year, the homeroom with the most points will get a trophy and a prize and a fabulous party,” advisor of link crew John Groess said.

This year is the first year BSM has held the Freshmen Cup. In the past, the Link Crew leaders would go to their designated homeroom about once a month and talk to freshmen about how their school year is going. This year, in place of these meetings, they created the Freshmen Cup. “We started doing it because when we talked to link crew leaders about making ninth graders feel welcome, it became evident that we did a really good job on the first day when they were doing games and they were having fun. But then as it went on throughout the year, it got less and less meaningful. So this is just an idea of how to try to continue to get kids to be engaged in doing some activities, as opposed to just getting talked to all the time,” Groess said.

The first Freshmen Cup took place in October. Each homeroom comes up with a name and makes a creative poster to represent their homeroom. “All the names were random categories, so this fall it was musical artists and food found in the fridge. Then we voted based on the posters for which team made the best one,” Link Crew member Siena Carver said.

Freshmen Cup gives the students a fun environment and an opportunity to make new friends with their other classmates. Many students often find themselves coming into the year knowing very few other students and sometimes they know no one. “The homeroom games are a way to build friendships and relationships among the freshmen this year. I think it’ll just be a fun competitive way to make some new friends. [It also] helps the freshmen build confidence being in front of others,” Carver said.

Freshmen that participated in the games thought it was a good use of time to get to know their classmates. They felt engaged and included in the community. “I thought it was fun. We really came together and shared, and it was a great sense of community,” freshman Rowan Steltzer said

With all of the positives these games bring, they take away from all the normal things freshmen do during homeroom. Homeroom gives students the opportunity to get homework done, talk to their friends, and talk to their teachers. “I think the homeroom games were entertaining, but… I’d rather work on my homework,” freshman Claire Ryan said.

The Freshmen Cup will continue throughout the rest of the year with different games each time. These games will also be included in the future year too. “We have some holiday-themed games. There are games like Simon Says. There’s trivia. There’s going to be bingo. There’s going to be a whole bunch of things,” Groess said.