A “Red Rally” is planned for this Thursday in the Matadome. “Red Rally,” despite how much it sounds like a Communist rally, is in fact a school spirit rally. The word on the street also says there’s a homecoming in the works.

Yes, you did read correctly. That did say spirit rally and homecoming. And I’m sure all of us had those in high school and this is, in fact, college.

I like the idea of a spirit rally to get some spirit into the students and get the Matador blood moving, if it would work. I can’t honestly remember if there ever has been a rally in hopes of upping the dreary levels of school spirit here, but something tells me there’s been attempts before. That’s not a good sign that I can’t remember any previous attempts. If there were any, they weren’t dazzling enough to catch my attention.

The title “Red Rally” could also be reworked. My first two thoughts were, “What’s that?” and “Is it a Communist thing?” If a student isn’t sure what this rally is, it seems unlikely that a large turnout will attend. Pure curiosity will only get so many students dropping by. Maybe a “Matador Rally” title might be more straightforward.

I also can’t help but wonder what will take place at this rally. In high school, there was a lot of screaming, cheerleaders dancing, and the occasional silly game between sports teams.

Power to A.S. though for at least trying to get people involved and more spirited. They’re not going down without a fight.

I’m more curious about a homecoming. And if memory serves me right, it happened during football season. We don’t even have a football team. So, which team is coming home then? Last I remember homecoming was held during the fall, not the spring. We’re going to have homecoming, in the spring, for a non-existent football team.

According to A.S., the homecoming has an $11,000 budget. That’s a nice little sum of money. Doesn’t seem like enough to fund a dance for our 33,000-plus students. It doesn’t really seem like enough for half of that unless A.S. has learned some super thrifty tips.

Good for A.S. for trying new ideas to get the Matador blood moving, we can use all the help we can get. CSUN students, on the whole, are the farthest thing vocal or expressive about their school pride. I don’t have any ideas on how to raise school spirit, otherwise I probably would have done it already, but we should be looking forward not back towards high school for ideas.

It just doesn’t seem like a homecoming dance, and to a lesser degree, a pep rally is really what gets the majority of students into the school spirit. It will appeal to a minority of the student population, instead of the majority of students. Ultimately, isn’t that who A.S. should really be trying to target? There already is a minority of the student population who are involved, spirited, and loving it. It’s the rest of us who A.S. should aim their main efforts and funding toward.