St. Edward’s University’s annual Homecoming Tailgate took place on Oct. 29 at Andre Lawn on campus. This event was an opportunity for people within the St. Edward’s community to gather and celebrate their SEU pride. 

Though St. Edward’s does not have a football team, a homecoming celebration is still held each year. Typically, it is held toward the beginning of the spring semester for our basketball teams. However, this year it was moved to the fall. 

Homecoming was not centered around one sport in particular but rather meant to celebrate all of the home games happening throughout the week, with the club rugby game taking place immediately following tailgating. 

“There’s a lot of things happening, and I think this is one of the times where students, faculty, staff can all just kind of come together with alumni and the general community to enjoy being part of St. Ed’s,” Abbie O’Neill, assistant director of Student Involvement, said.

The homecoming tailgate is one of the bigger events held on campus throughout the year, so it is important for Student Involvement to get more students out there. Student Involvement makes the effort to ensure that student organizations can get a spot on the lawn to represent themselves. 

“We have some money saved in our office usually every year to allow for student organizations to get some of that funding for their org to tailgate,” said O’Neill. “This year, it was as long as they had a Topper Cup team and had somebody nominated for homecoming court, they didn’t have to be on the court, but just nominated.”

In order to get the funding underway and the student organizations involved, the planning for Homecoming and tailgating must be done well in advance.

“It does take quite a bit of time and logistics and things like that, but we want to make sure that everything’s ready to go when we open registration and get the word out to everyone that this is the date, this is when it’s happening. Bring your tent, bring your chairs, and just hang out,” said O’Neill.