
DATE: Saturday, October 25, 1997            TAG: 9710250372

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY LORRAINE EATON, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: NORFOLK                           LENGTH:   96 lines

BRING BACK HOMECOMING, WITH SPIRIT NORVIEW HIGH SCHOOL REVIVES AN ALL-BUT-FORGOTTEN TRADITION.

No one can say quite when it happened. Or why.

But when Vicki Speece asked a Norview High School cheerleader about homecoming, she realized that a tradition that once brought the community together had somehow fallen completely apart.

``This still shocks me,'' said Speece, Norview's student resource coordinator. ``This girl, a cheerleader, said that homecoming was the home game after several away games.''

Speece quizzed other students about the school's fight song.

Never heard of it, they said.

And chrysanthemums?

``This is the first time I have ever heard of them,'' said Amanda Irvin, 17, a Norview senior and chairperson of the school's Leadership Council. ``I never knew it was the traditional flower of homecoming.''

While other schools move further from time-honored traditions, this year Norview students, business owners, alumni and volunteers came together to plan the most traditional Norview High homecoming since who knows when. Planning started this fall, when Speece taught what could be called ``homecoming classes,'' where every Norview student learned the fight song.

``Homecoming is important,'' Speece said. ``I think what is missing in students' lives is a sense of community. If they have pride in their schools, they will feel better about themselves and the neighborhood in which they live.''

The revival started Friday with a pep rally, one tradition that somehow survived through the years. But instead of bestowing the Norview ``spirit stick'' upon the class that yelled the loudest, the award this year went to the senior class. They sang Norview's fight song with the most conviction.

The festivities continue at 10 a.m. today, when a parade will snake down Sewells Point Road toward the high school. Edwin W. Chittum, 85, former Norview principal and superintendent of Norfolk County Schools, will serve as grand marshal.

For years, Norview had no homecoming parade. The ``floats'' that circled the football field at halftime were ``a bunch of people yelling and screaming out of the back of a pickup truck,'' Speece said.

There are 45 units in this year's parade, including entries from local businesses, churches, civic leagues, the classes of '46 and '57, and two real floats decorated with crepe paper. The homecoming court will glide along the parade route aboard convertibles, an effort organized by Thomas A. Cole, owner of Norview Exxon.

Cole has also donated saucer-sized white mums for each cheerleader to wear at each home game this year.

``And we've got all the churches praying that it doesn't rain,'' Cole said.

Before today's 1 p.m. game pitting the Norview Pilots against the Churchland Truckers, people can picnic on school grounds with music provided by the group Reflections. And a pair of World War II planes will soar over the football field during the festivities.

People involved in the effort believe that bringing back these traditions can offset the ugly, yet necessary, side of public schools, the metal detectors and the armed policeman that they say change the atmosphere of high school football games, the nature of school spirit and the community.

``Over the years so much has been lost,'' said Trish ``Patti'' Rogers, a member of Norview's Class of '67 and owner of Beach Breeze Florist in Norview.

Rogers donates homecoming mums at cost to students to sell for fund-raisers. ``We're trying to get Norview back to being a nice community where there is a lot of togetherness.''

Speece says homecoming has been ``a tough sell'' to teens who say they need to spend their spare time working, not making floats. But when she shows them faded yearbook pictures of how things used to be, they join the effort.

``It's just neat,'' Cole said. ``It's all building back up.''

But while Norview wants a traditional homecoming, other high schools across South Hampton Roads are moving further and further away from those mums.

Ocean Lakes High School in Virginia Beach, for example, will hold combined homecoming and Halloween festivities on Friday. School-spirited students plan to parade freaky floats around the football field promoting school clubs. There's even a rumor that one girl will parade as Michael Jackson's curly-haired girlfriend from his ``Thriller'' video.

Two weeks ago, Tallwood High School in Virginia Beach held its homecoming with the theme ``Carnival of Nations.'' The traditional mums were replaced with colored balloons.

Booker T. Washington High School in Norfolk also did things a little differently for its homecoming celebrations last month. Senior Michelle Fletcher, 19, was one of many evening-gown clad girls who, during halftime, walked around the track sporting banners with the name of an after-school club. Michelle was Miss Debate. MEMO: Campus correspondent Michelle Mizal contributed to this story. ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

MARK MITCHELL/The Virginian-Pilot

Norview High School students turned out in force Friday for a pep

rally, to show support for the Pilots' football efforts today

against the Churchland Truckers.

MARK MITCHELL/The Virginian-Pilot

Cheering at the Norview High School pep rally on Friday are, front

row, students Michelle Ambrosio, left, Tawana McCroe, Rebecca Mann

and Darmeshia Hampton.