As soon as you step into the Bryce Jordan Center during THON you immediately see the huge, handmade signs that light up the stands. It’s a lot to take in at first but it’s also pretty magical to see so much devotion by student organizations.
Students orgs and Greek life spend months raising money for THON. They go canning and hold fundraisers at their houses–such as a puppy fundraiser where you can pay a couple dollars to be around dogs. So when THON finally comes around, its no surprise that these students do their best to represent their group in the stands.
It seems that each student group has a theme when they go to THON and it’s awesome to witness the chaos of competing themes. So how do they even maintain their presence in the stands? Each group will often times have rotating shifts between members so that they never lose their place in the stands. That means some attendees have to be there from late at night to the very early morning. It is usually the newest members or pledges who get the craziest shifts.
The themes you see at THON are always kid friendly, involving popular movies, cartoons, or books for young children. After all, THON is for the kids! There is nothing better than seeing some of the kids play around on the Bryce Jordan Center floor.
This year there were a lot of incredible signs and themes.
The stands were decorated with animal print letters that tied into a zoo/safari theme. You could also see Lego Movie signs and letters that said “Everything is Awesome.”
Photo by Danielle James
It wouldn’t be about the kids if there wasn’t superheros! One section had Captain America and the Flash logos on their letters.
Photo by Danielle James
Some of the cutest themes involved Dr. Seuss characters and Nemo fish hats.
Photo by Danielle James
But one of the coolest light up signs was hard to miss- a set of neon colors that changed, spelling out BLVD.
Photo by Danielle James
What was your favorite theme at THON 2017?
