Liberty High School is hosting the homecoming 2025 tailgate on Friday, Sept. 26, from 4-6 p.m. in the student parking lot to provide community and connect students with clubs and other programs. Tailgate happens every year after school before the Homecoming game, and both tailgate and game take place at Liberty the day before the homecoming dance.
“Tailgate is an annual event that we do during every homecoming … This was established long before I got here seven years ago,” assistant principal Lianne Theissen stated. “It is an opportunity for our clubs’ activities and some of our athletic programs to earn money for their organizations … enjoy good food at a cheap price and be able to support the programs that we have here at Liberty.”
There are many booths at Liberty, some of which include girls soccer’s photo booth and Crumbl Cookies, volleyball’s face painting and barbeque chicken plates, the environmental club’s cotton candy machine, baseball’s grilled cheese, Link Crew’s dunk tank, and five tables from student council.
Senior and student council Vice President Savannah Harvey stated, “We have a tradition that we’re bringing back, and each grade in student council is going to have representatives doing a competition within STUCO, so each grade will have a different table.”
Harvey continued, “What’s fun about this is it’s going to get student council competitive about it, and hopefully we can get more sales and more participation in the games or the things that we’re selling at tailgate.”
Harvey provided that seniors are doing root beer floats for their booth. “I think it’ll just be fun to see which grade level has the most creativity and who receives the most feedback and participation at each table,” she said.
Student council freshmen are doing cornhole and providing drinks, according to sophomore and student council representative Eastland Stinchcomb.
“We’re going to have different flavors of sprinkles and seasoning. And we’re having a special one with s’mores. We’ll add chocolate and graham crackers. It’s going to be good. Really good,” Stinchcomb explained.
The juniors will be doing a bake sale, with an additional booth from Breann Koldeway, head of student council, which is selling light-up foam glowsticks.
According to Thiessen, students can come get some food, hang out with friends and family, get their face painted before the football game, play carnival games and more. It is also an opportunity to get involved and find out what some of our clubs and programs are and what they do.
She continued, “We have Liberty swag. A couple of our programs have done things like sumo wrestling and pie in the face before … Link crew does a dunk tank, which is fun … Our dance program does a pasta bar, which is super great.”
Math teacher Annie Whipple gave more information about the Link Crew dunk tank. Students will have to pay for tickets to throw or to volunteer to get dunked. Two tickets get students three throws, and three tickets get students sitting on the ledge to be dunked.
Thiessen believes that tailgate is especially valuable to new students. “I think it’s a great option for new students to get to know other students … Because, of course, that’s what we always want people to do, is be part of that community as they are Lancers for four years.”