The first step of deciding the court consists of one round of nominations and every student has the chance to be nominated. 

     “We open up nominations for two days and anyone can be nominated and anyone can nominate themselves,” Haynes said. “If your name gets turned in, no matter how many there are, your name will be on that first ballot because I know how important this is to some people”. 

     After the round of nominations, voting is held in two rounds. For the senior princess, a third round is held to determine the winner. This year, third round voting was required for Mr. School Spirit as there was a tie between Will D’Alonzo and Josiah Jernigan after the second round. At halftime, all the finalists make their way to the field and then the queen is announced and crowned.

     Normally the final four princesses go out onto the field however this year there was a three way tie for third place so five princesses walked out and then the queen was chosen of those five.  

     Although Rose has a homecoming queen, there is no homecoming king. Haynes said that Rose used to have a king but stopped many years ago, due to several reasons.

     “We used to have both a homecoming king and queen but now we only have a queen because almost all of the time the person who was elected for king was on the football team therefore they were not able to participate in the halftime events,” Haynes said. “I just didn’t think it was fair to keep doing that because they wouldn't even find out they won until it was all over.” 

     Homecoming voting is grade restricted which means you're only allowed to nominate and vote for the candidates in your own grade. 

     The way Rose announces the homecoming court winners has changed over the past few years.

     “We used to hold a pep rally the afternoon of homecoming and we would announce the winner of Mr. and Miss school spirit there,” Haynes said. “But since we haven't had pep rallies the past few years they have just been recognized during the morning announcements.”

     There has been an SGA committee working since the beginning of school trying to secure cars and get as much done ahead of time as possible. However, Haynes said there are a lot of things that can not be done until the day of the game. 

     “Homecoming day starts very early, about 6:30 in the morning I go to Publix or Harris Teeter and pick up the flowers and then we have to put all the bouquets together,” Haynes said. “We have to make sure the scripts are ready and then before the game starts we have to make sure all the cars are lined up and then in the right order.”

     Once the cars arrive at the field for halftime, all members of the court receive their flowers and sashes and go inside the cars to ride into the stadium. 

     Haynes expressed that the biggest stress in dealing with homecoming this year was the reliability of the cars. One car broke down seconds before the court was supposed to make their appearance.

     “The girls I had helping me that night handled the situation very well,” Haynes said. “They moved the freshman princess to the sophomore princess’s car and those two just rode out together.”

     Although there were a few bumps in the road such as the car breaking down,  Haynes felt it was a very successful night.

     “The students that were helping didn't panic and they kept on going and to me, that is leadership in the making,” Haynes said.