While Mariah Jones escaped serious injury and property damage from Hurricane Irma, her school spirit didn’t fare as well. Coming back to a postponed Powderpuff let the senior feeling annoyed. Originally scheduled at the beginning of Spirit Week, Powderpuff had to be rescheduled for next spring due to a lack of preparation time.

“I’m really frustrated because now we have to wait an entire semester,” Jones said. “I understand that the hurricane a ected a lot of events but I don’t think pushing it back that far was really necessary. This is supposed to be like our big Homecoming game, but it doesn’t even match up with Homecoming which makes no sense to me.”

Although Powderpuff was scheduled for Sept. 19, the day after students returned to school, administration held a meeting to discuss the best possible move for students.

“Obviously we had no time for practice or anything. We came back to school on Monday and Powderpu was supposed to be on Tuesday,” Assistant Principal of facilities Catherine Halbuer said. “In our administration meeting we talked about whether the students would have had the same experience as they would if they had been more prepared for the event. Even if it’d be a fair competition for the juniors and seniors. Seniors would have an advantage over juniors because they had the opportunity to participate last year, so they kind of know how the game goes.”

Despite some negative backlash, junior Zoe Moore appeared satis ed with the decision.

“Overall I’m glad we still get to do it because I thought that it would be canceled altogether,” Moore said. “Looking at the bright side of things we have another fun-filled, relaxed week of school. Powderpuff and Wildcat Challenge being in the same week and also having another Spirit Week makes for chill time right before Spring Break and relieves some of our stress, so I genuinely think it was a good move. “

Halbuer said the administration team took a hard look into what the students wanted while still keeping it in their best interest.

“We just wanted to take a lot of aspects into consideration to really make it a quality event,” she said. “We brought in the Senior Class officers to brainstorm ideas about when we should have and they all ultimately decided that in the spring was the best idea.”

Senior Kayla Garoust still has conflicted feelings on pushing the game back so far.

“I don’t really think we had a real say in the decision-making,” she said. “I don’t think pushing it back makes a difference, but it would’ve been nice to have it sooner.”