Caroline Fellows
Contributing Writer
With an average workday of 9 ½ hours, activities director Jerry Collins oversees everything from how the swim team will get to its next away meet to organizing the school dances.
“We oversee everything that’s not class related,” Collins said.
During the day, Collins meets with various coaches and sponsors about their upcoming events, meetings and/or games.
“I basically try to handle as much as the extra stuff as possible so coaches can focus on coaching,” Collins said. He makes sure there are referees, officials and transportation and organizes entry fees for upcoming games.
Collins attends most of the home sports games, and during the winter, when there are a lot of games, he may be at school until 9 p.m. twice a week.
The activities office, room 261 is the place to go for school IDs, pictures, awards and check and eligibility. “We sell dance tickets,” Kim Edwards, Collins’ secretary said. Edwards also types up the daily announcements from the notices given to her by various teachers and sponsors, and she handles the majority of organizing transportation for club and field trips.
Collins also praised his assistant, Cliff Ice, whose primary role is involved in planning school dances, although “he does a little bit of everything” as said by Collins.
Ice begins preparing for prom 14-15 months beforehand along with the junior class council and sponsors. He especially offers insight on locations for it to be held, since he has been to past proms and makes most of the decisions.
Ice also is the coordinator of VTS, which the transportation for students in live in St. Louis City, and the community campus program, which allows students to get credit from doing things outside of school like volunteering or jobs.
The most widely attended school dance, the Friendship Dance, sells about 800-900 tickets, about 400 more than any other dance.
“A lot more students attend the Friendship Dance, and there’s Kirkwood who matches us or has more, so we’re looking at around 2,000 students,” Collins said. The second most attended dance is prom, which has around 400 people, and the least is Back in Black with 150 with Winter Homecoming in the middle with about 200 students.
Part of Collins’ duties is to chaperone the school dances along with other administrators. “And we usually have a group of parents help who work coat check or concessions,” Collins said.
When a student is interested in forming a new after school club, he/she goes through the activities office. A form completed with an identification of a sponsor and a petition of at least 50 signatures is taken to and administrative meeting and then chartered by Student Council.
Every year, Collins tallies up the number of students involved in after school activities or sports.
Seventy-five percent of students at Webster Groves High School are involved in at least one after school activity or sport. However, this does not include club sports like hockey or lacrosse.
“Our goal is for every student to be involved in something,” Collins said.
