Powderpuff has not always been during half time at the Homecoming football game at Waterford high school. Most upperclassmen can tell you they watched a powderpuff game during the pep rally during school hours during their sophomore and/or freshman year. The pep rally game was hosted during this time for many years up until two years ago. If you ask teachers that have graduated from Waterford, they can tell you they experienced the game the Thursday night before the homecoming game.

That version of Powderpuff was its own separate night, before the homecoming game. It was a fully played out game, with football boys coaching, as well as being much longer than the couple minutes girls get to perform now.

Many teachers say the full night of powder puff was changed due to lack of audience, safety, and teachers helping out. It made powderpuff unsafe in many ways. But if we could get enough support, would people participating want to change it back to the old ways?

The mid-day pep rally game is the least popular option for powderpuff. This option comes with many issues. Some issues brought up were, the audience not caring about the game, the day time effect rather than night time effect under the lights, and parents not being able to come watch and support. Although a huge positive to this option is that it allows the football team to coach their grade rather than them not even being able to watch.

Hannah Grant doesn’t like the mid-day pep rally game option, “I remember it was super cold and a lot of students weren’t really paying attention to the game. I also feel like a lot of spectators got pretty bored of the game. In retrospect, I don’t like this time better.”

Mrs. Shannon, a gym teacher at Waterford high school, graduated from Waterford in 2010. She participated in both years of powderpuff and won her Senior year. “We played the night before the homecoming football game during the pep rally, and we played a full game, 10 minute halves or more, but it was a longer game, although it still felt short.”

Mrs. Shannon thinks there is no wrong way to do it, but if she had to choose, the night before would be the best, “I think the football players should be able to coach, and parents should be able to come and watch, and it should be a longer game.”

Mrs. B is a big part of running the powderpuff game, she agrees with Shannon in a way, “There are schools that do a huge Powder Puff night and I would like to learn more about this and how they make it successful.”

Although she thinks it would be cool, Mrs. B sees the many flaws with the game the night before, “less participation and enthusiasm exist to participate or it only really targets a select audience, I would love it to be a full game; however I worry that the audience may not be as large.”

Fewer issues have come up with the way powderpuff has been run the past two years. Hannah Grant agrees, “I feel like playing with the lights and the larger crowd during the homecoming game halftime made the game more dramatic. I also felt that having the whole day to lead up to the game increased the anticipation for the game. Having Mr. Silvestri doing the play-by-play was a super cool experience as well.”

Mrs. B agrees to an extent, “having it a half time of Homecoming is ideal to have parents being able to see the game, as well as having the best audience in my opinion. I think the unfortunate part is that the football players who coach do not get the opportunity to see the game after the work they have put in on practices and developing plays.”

Taking in account all the positives and negatives to each version of the Powder Puff games, what do you think would be the best option for the powderpuff game? Should we attempt to change it back to the original ways, or keep it the way we’ve been doing it?