After school on Friday, Dec. 13, when most of the students had gone home, ASB began pulling Christmas decorations out of boxes. Wreaths, paper cutouts, string lights, wrapping paper, a Christmas tree, and one giant inflatable snowman were all assembled in the commons. This was ASB’s “Deck the Halls” event, an annual IHS tradition where students decorate the commons and hallways for the holiday season. According to this year’s Winterfest Assembly theme, the school was to be decorated with Disney characters. Freshmen had Frozen in the performing arts wing, sophomores had Marvel in the first floor hallway, juniors had the Incredibles in the second floor hallway, and seniors had Star Wars in the lower commons.

While making a giant BB-8 out of paper, Senior Class President Madi Yeh explained that ASB puts on “Deck the Halls” every year because it does a lot for school spirit. “It’s an opportunity for people to come together across different grades,” she said. “Even when students don’t participate, just coming in and seeing the school decorated can be really unifying and uplifting,” she continued.

In past years, this was a huge event for ASB, with tons of volunteers from across the school gathering to put up lights, wrapping paper, and paper cutout designs. But this year, turnout was much lower. Few lights were put up and nearly no one below twelfth grade participated. “It’s a larger ASB problem as a whole,” Yeh added. “The fact that we’re still trying to figure out how we want to do communication between ASB and the student body this year. We don’t have iVision and that had usually been our prime communication source,” she said. They have been using posts on Instagram and the IHS website to make announcements, but it has not been very effective.

Allyson Espinosa, one of the few freshman at the event, discussed her experience. Her sister, who graduated from IHS a few years prior, had told her that “Deck the Halls” was a big annual tradition at the school. “She said people would walk into school the next day and everything would be really festive and fun, so she encouraged me to go,” Espinosa recalled. While drawing Olaf from Frozen on a poster, her friend, freshman Michael Lim, added, “The other classes are doing really good, but I’m not sure about the freshmen right now.” What he did not know was that the sophomore and junior classes were not doing any better.

Regardless, Yeh remained optimistic. “Even though we had a little bit of a lower turnout this year, I think the people who are here are having a good time,” Yeh said. As the afternoon went on, more and more students joined in, attracted by the festive lights and loud holiday music. Holiday spirit may have been on the rocks this year, but at the end of the evening, there were multiple character cutouts, an impressive string light cursive “Issy,” and a twenty-foot inflatable snowman in the IHS commons.