Orcutt Academy High School students, faculty, and staff come together as a community, celebrate our unique school culture, and show our Spartan pride through these much-loved annual traditions.
Homecoming: The Court & The Crown
Homecoming week is one of the best weeks of school. We have an eventful week with lunchtime activities, spirit days, and of course, the football game and dance
Season of Serve: Paying It Forward
Dubbed by some as “Community Service on steroids,” this two week period is organized by ASB with one clear aim: Give Back Hard!ASB and the student body supports a local community organization and participates in service-learning projects over the course of two weeks during the “Season of Serve” each year. Projects range from campus beautification (painting the staff lunch area walls, weeding the garden, cleaning gum off the underside of desks and tables in classrooms, picking up trash) to volunteering at local shelters. A concluding element in the whole Season of Serve is the competition of who earned the most service hours. The true winners are anyone who participates and finds out that giving back is the most rewarding thing of all!
Rallies: Operation Spartan Spirit
Everybody do the big blue wave! Rallies at OA are full of multiple different games and activities, all planned out by the ASB class. The ASB class puts their all into making sure our students have a good time and are ready to go head first into school spirit. There are rallies for sports, robotics and academic achievements. We use these rallies to acknowledge our students and the activities they love. With performances by cheer, dance and band to get students pumped up.
Balloon Fest: Learn by Doing
The Orcutt Academy Geology classes has the opportunity to collect actual meteorological data by participating in OA’s Balloon Fest. The 7-foot diameter balloons go airborne every February (when there isn’t a helium shortage!).
Students decide which atmospheric data they wanted to collect using specific sensors and a Vernier LabQuest, and then design and build custom gondolas to best secure that equipment as it rises 300 feet in the air. Students are able to measure a variety of atmospheric characteristics such as air pressure, temperature, oxygen or carbon dioxide levels, ultraviolet radiation, humidity, and more! After collecting their data, teams bring their LabQuests back to the room, collect the graphs, and presented their findings.
Quiz Bowl: A Battle of Wits & Pride
Orcutt Academy High School’s annual Quiz Bowl continues to grow in popularity and anticipation. The rules are simple: teams of four go head to head answering a series of difficult questions until one team comes out on top.
The Quiz Bowl was brought to our school by Mr. Gregory Verch who competed in the event himself in high school. This year there were eight teams of four competing. Certain teams were sponsored by clubs such as the National Honor Society, Christian Club, and Ping Pong Club. The team with the most points in the end of the competition wins a lunch and goes head to head with the teachers in front at an all-school rally. Needless to say, the atmosphere is tense at the rally! Although Spartan student teams have come close, they have yet to taste glory against the teacher team as they remain unbeaten in the last four years. Best of luck next year, students!
Poetry Out Loud: Bringing Words to Life
Every year around February, students in all English classes participate in a national competition known as Poetry Out Loud, where students memorize and perform a poem of their choosing to their peers. Students begin Poetry Out Loud by choosing a poem from the competition website, then memorizing the poem and performing it in front of their English classes. From those performances, teachers pick exceptional students from their classes to perform in a school-wide competition against students from other classes. Winners from the school competition have the chance to advance even further towards county, state, and national competitions.
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