Lettuce Romaine Calm: CB’s Most Polarizing Homecoming Theme

It’s E Set, and I’m half watching KBFT, half playing a game on my phone. All of a sudden, the highly anticipated Hoco theme video comes on. I look up, ready to see a theme like Disco, Hollywood Red Carpet, or Starry Night. What comes next no one expecting, except the all knowers of student government.

The theme is announced.

Lettuce.

The peaceful vibe of the classroom is kaled, as the class breaks out into discussion. What kind of a theme is lettuce?! What’s next, fruit salad prom? Where did this idea come from? Brace yourselves Falcons, we’re about to go on a groundbreaking investigation of the most discussed, posted about, and thought about Homecoming theme since the Harry Potter Hoco of ‘14. 

To start the investigation I talked to the source of all things student government, the one and only Mrs. Cecilia Powers, the ASB student council moderator. I was looking for context and a look into how student government functions, having never been a member myself. To understand how a theme like lettuce came to be, I was going to need to understand how a Hoco theme is decided upon and what the thought process behind one is like.

“Usually it’s a big topic of conversation when we get together in the summertime,” Mrs. Powers says. However, this time around, things were a bit different.

“The seniors got together before camp and they did some brainstorming and narrowed it down to four choices,” Mrs. Powers says. “The full student council talked about the positives and negatives of each.

“My first reaction [to the lettuce theme] was ‘that’s different!’ But I’m always up for something different…once the light bulb went on and people understood the possibilities it seemed like it had a lot of potential.”

And Mrs. Powers was right — this year CB had very successful spirit days with the students looking radishing and wearing clothes following themes of 1000 islands, ranch, house dressing, and chef’s special. 

“Some of the generic ones were thrown out there, like ‘New York’ and things like that,” Senior Class Council President Sydney Walsh (’24) recalls of the seniors brainstorming ideas. “We saw on Pinterest that someone did a lettuce spirit week and were like ‘that’d be so funny if we did that!’”

There were some spirit themes that did not make the cut. “We were thinking about a balsamic day that was like preppy, or Caesar which would have been Greek,” Syndey shared. But she stands by the themes student council ended up deciding on. “I feel like the ones that we went with worked out pretty well. They were accessible and that was our goal.”

On her personal favorite hoco theme, Sydney recalls her sophomore year. “I thought the music one was really cool — each day it was easy but it was also fun and engaging.” With revision and a lot of thought by student council, the lettuce theme was born and a whole salad of activities and dress days with it. 

The impact of the reveal of this Hoco theme cannot be stressed enough — students took to social media platforms to discuss the theme, talked about it with their friends, and was a topic of discussion among teachers. Never before had I seen CB students so passionate, or for that matter, so confused, on a Hoco theme. By going with such an unconventional theme, CB had started a wildfire of discussion, reaching beyond CB to other high schools all around the area. However, the theme began to grow on many people as the spirit days began.

“When you first think about it, its like what? Lettuce? …With the spirit days it came together, but just looking at the theme it’s confusing.” Natalya Negroni (‘24) comments. That seems to be the common consensus around campus — most people were romaining skeptical of the lettuce theme, yet when the spirit days came around, the confusion and dislike of lettuce was kaled for the better. 

What started out as a theme that was confusing and disliked became an iconic moment in CB history. Lettuce Hoco of ‘23 will go down in history as one of the most memorable themes of all time. Any school could pull of a Hollywood Red Carpet Hoco, but it takes a special kind of school to pull off a lettuce hoco. Romaine true to yourselves and keep makin’ outside of the box ideas, Falcons.