The first few weeks back to school are crucial for setting the right tone for the year with your student council officers and the whole school.
With a few intentionally selected activities, you and your student leaders can create a big impact on making your school and the new year positive and welcoming.
These are 25 of my favorite back-to-school school spirit ideas, both school-wide projects and teambuilding activities for just your student council or leadership students, to fill out the first few weeks of the school year.
Ideally, you’ll want to meet with your officers in the summer before the school year starts so things are ready to go on the very first day. Many of the activity ideas listed here are meant for exactly that. Use this as a starter list for your brainstorming session with your officers.
Check out my 25 Fall Spirit Ideas blog post for more general fall-related spirit projects and activities.
If you’re a brand new student council advisor, you’ll want also to check out my posts on the First 5 Actions to Take as a StuCo Advisor and my Favorite 5 Intro Lessons for Leadership Class.
After your students decide on the activities they want to do (making sure they don’t overcommit themselves!), create committees and assign project leads for the larger tasks. Hand each group a project planning kit and let them do the rest!
Pick a Theme for the Year
If you didn’t already, at the end of the previous year, pick a theme for the year.
It can be based on an inspirational quote, a current trending song, a popular motif—really, anything that resonates with your leaders! Just keep it simple and ensure it’s something you can connect to throughout the year.
Some ideas are “Be Brave, Be You, Belong” (if your school is working on SEL skills), “Soaring to New Heights” (with a goal-setting focus), or “Under Construction” (if it’s a remodel year).
Throughout the year, relate back to the theme with bulletin boards, dedicated segments in the morning announcements, the school-wide projects you do, and reflection questions you ask your leaders.
Put Together New Staff Kits
Give a warm welcome to new staff members with goody bags. Gather up a school lanyard, mascot t-shirt, stickers, or anything else school branded. Throw in some mints, highlighters, pens, and a welcome letter with any essential-to-know-school traditions.
Work with your Boosters or PTA for some funds to make your newest members feel connected on Day 1.
Welcome Staff Back
Have your leaders write quick-but-heartfelt notes to staff members welcoming them back and sharing reasons they are excited to take their class or work with them this year.
This School Color Spirit Card Kit is perfect for this!
Make Classroom Door Posters
Create door posters for each staff member, displaying their name, the classes they teach, or other duties in large letters. Feel free also to add doodles of anything they’re known for, like their wacky socks, the coffee mug always in their hand, or tennis racket if they’re the tennis coach.
These also will help students more easily find their classes and get to know their teachers better.
Make Locker Signs
Use this Spirit Locker Sign Kit to celebrate your students. Create recognition signs for students participating in sports and activities, any new students, birthdays, and many more options for the whole year!
Create First-Day Selfie Backdrops
Construct a fun backdrop or two for selfies and group photos on the first day of school. Design them using your chosen theme or your mascot and school colors.
Design Back-to-School Bulletin Boards
Simple ideas include “180 Days To…” with all sorts of bucket list challenges like inviting a new student to eat lunch with you or joining a new sport or club activity.
Or, if you have class hallways, create a “Welcome Home” design with name cards of everyone in that class.
Save a board or two for once the school year starts. For example, after completing the GREAT Goal-Setting kit with your leaders, display their slips with the header “This is Going to be a GREAT Year!”
First Day High-Fives
Assign your leaders to each exterior entrance to play upbeat music, hold the door open, and high-five students as they enter on the first day of school.
First Day Helpers
Have your leaders wear something super noticeable, like neon yellow safety vests or over-the-top spirit gear, on the first day of school. That way, any students needing help finding their classes or opening their locker have someone to ask.
This works especially well if you have an assembly first thing in the morning or your leaders greet everyone at the door, so students know to look for them.
Host New Students
Give your new students a special big welcome!
Get a list from your secretary of students new to your school. Pair your leaders up with them on their first day to show them around campus, give them all the must-know information, and be a friendly face for them during lunch.
Ideally, pair your leaders with new students with the same lunch and a few classes.
Adopt a Freshman
Have your upperclassman go into the freshman classes to meet in small groups. Be sure to prep them with conversation starters!
The goal is for the freshman to have an older classmate they can trust and feel comfortable going to. It will be important for your upper-level students to continue the bond by checking in with them and inviting them to school events throughout the fall.
Meet Your Officers
Create a “Meet Your Officers” wall display with photos and brief captions of each of your executive and class officers.
Include details like what they’re most excited about and their goals for the year, what they were most nervous about as freshmen, and their advice to any new student.
Templates for this are inside my StuCo Advisor Starter Kit.
Build a Spirit Gear Closet
This combines well with collecting gently worn school spirit gear and mascot clothing in the spring as seniors graduate. Now that it’s the new school year let students know when and how to access this closet.
If your school has a tradition of wearing school colors on every Friday tradition or has class colors, consider expanding to have clothes in those colors too.
Host a Club Fair During Lunch
Ring tables around the lunchroom one day with representatives from all your school’s clubs, sports, and activities to showcase their program and invite others to join.
Other great times for this are the registration days before school, Open House Night, or during Freshman orientation.
Create a Command Central
Build a large wall display in a high-traffic area where clubs and teams have a space to post their schedules, flyers, and other promotional or announcement information.
Fashion (Police) Show
Nobody likes the mandatory review of all the school rules and policies.
So, see if you can liven up the assembly or advisory presentation with your student leaders performing skits modeling what-not-to-wear and rules not to break. They will undoubtedly make it more fun while still communicating the necessary information.
Messages of Positivity
A week or two into the school year, after the first-week excitement has passed, grab a tub of sidewalk chalk, and write uplifting, welcoming, and positive messages on the walkways around campus.
Home Game Competition
Hype up the first big home game of the school year by making attendance into a class competition. Organize carpools and have your leaders invite their new student buddies.
Consider hosting some special activities, too, like a face painting station before kickoff.
Teach the Fight Song
Also, before the first big home game, have some of your upperclassmen leaders go into the freshman classes for a few minutes to run through your school’s fight song a few times. This is a great way to encourage them to attend the game and share any other essential information, like other stadium traditions, where to sit, etc.
Letter to Future You
Have your leaders write letters to themselves to open on the last day of school.
Ask them to include their hopes and wishes for the school year, how they want to grow as a student, leader, and person, and what they want to leave behind for this new year.
Decide if you want to make it a sealed letter that you mark off for completion or if you can peek at it before storing them in safekeeping. This is a great way to get to know your students more personally if you do the second option, but whichever you decide, make it clear!
Commit to a GREAT Goal
Use my GREAT Goal framework to help your leaders set achievable but also stretch goals for the new school year.
GREAT stands for Gaugeable, Relevant, Exact, Attainable, and Timely, which helps refine your leaders’ ideas into something actionable.
These elements help answer questions like “Can the goal be measured so I know when I achieved it?”, “Is the goal appropriate for this season of life?” and “When is my deadline to achieve it?”
Then incorporate goal check-ins into your monthly or quarterly reflections, asking how their progress is going.
Pick One Word of the Year
Still want to do goal setting, but a little less formal than a GREAT Goal? Picking a word of the year is a great low-key alternative!
This is a perfect first-day activity with your leaders and can be turned into an easy bulletin board too. My One Word of the Year Kit has everything ready to go.
Commit to a Mission Statement
After your leaders have done some team building and gotten to know each other, have them craft a mission statement for the year.
Look over a few different constitution preambles (the United States, your own state’s, your school student body’s, and even a local tribe’s) and search for a few corporate mission statement examples to analyze as a group.
I’ve found that government ones are better mentor texts for this task, but the business ones show how to add creative flare.
Using consensus, draft and then wordsmith a final version of your group’s mission statement for the year. Write it on a larger piece of paper, have everyone sign it, then laminate and post it on your wall as a constant reminder.
Create High-Fives
This is one of my favorite back-to-school team builders. Have students trace and cut out one of their hands. On each finger, write the answer to five questions. Feel free to use these ideas below or create your own!
Thumb: Who here do you think will be most indispensable this year?
Pointer: How do you hope to lead and serve others this year?
Middle: Who here do you admire the most?
Ring: Who is someone here you are excited to get to know better?
Pinky: What is something we should constantly remind ourselves of this year?
Have your leaders share out one of their fingers with the group, then post the hands somewhere in your room as a reminder throughout the year. A great place is around your mission statement if you have room!
This activity and other team builders are included in my Intro to Leadership unit.
Library Card Competition
September is National Library Card Sign-up Month, so host a friendly class competition for how many students already have or signed up for a local public library card. Invite your local librarians to set up a sign-up table one day during lunch.
Hopefully, this list gives you and your student leaders more than enough spirit project ideas for back to school. Be sure to grabmy Project Planning Kit, which is a lifesaver in allowing your student leaders to take the lead in brainstorming, planning, and executing all their ideas to kick-start the new year. The best part is that these universal templates and forms become a how-to guide for next year’s group!
Image credit: Element5 Digital
