In the past, Mt. SAC Early College Academy (MECA) has had 4 houses, named Sigma (blue), Delta (green), Gamma (orange), and Kappa (yellow). This year, the houses had a complete revamp. They will now be themed each year, and this year’s theme is cards. The four houses will be Hearts (red), Clubs (green), Spades (black), and Diamonds (blue).
Associated Student Body (ASB) president, Kristabella Rodriguez, feels confident that this will help build excitement for students and staff. ASB collectively voted on this and hopes that by changing the theme every year, students will feel refreshed, not feel easily bored by the house competitions, and meet different house members each year.
The vote for this theme was overwhelming during an ASB meeting, so hopes are high that the Cards theme will succeed. However, students who were not involved in the decision-making process had different thoughts on this change. Senior Gabriel Metzgar wishes they still had their old houses as it made MECA unique. He stated, “They made it sound more college-oriented and made it sound more professional.” Fellow senior, Giselle Martinez also agrees, sharing, “The whole thing is MECA (ECA) – Early College Academy.” They feel that changing the houses takes away part of the college aspect of the school.
Despite that, President Rodriguez feels that changing the houses will help MECA students feel like regular high school students, having a more “basic” theme. “We got inspiration from other schools. Other schools were doing things like Toy Story themes and we wanted to be a part of that. We wanted our high school to feel more like a high school, and we thought why not pick a house theme where it’s pretty much equal for the first year,” she elaborated.
On a more positive note, Senior Alexander Xu feels the house change is “significant,” but notes that he is very excited about the house competitions this year, as a member of the Clubs house.
Senior Lizberth Huerta is overjoyed to be welcomed into the Diamonds house. Opposite to most other students’ thoughts, she likes the “unique” cards idea and hopes the school can host more events oriented to the cards theme like having dress-up days.
Students’ new houses were revealed to them during the week of September 16th through the 20th, and different grades were posted daily. Teachers were revealed Tuesday, September 24th, and they all cheered as their names and houses were announced from the speakers during lunch.
Huerta is eager to meet new people in her house, and she’s in luck as MECA’s first house competition of the year is on Friday, September 27th. This will help ring in the excitement for the Homecoming Dance in the MPR that evening. Everyone will get a chance to play, as it will be split up into three games, Freshmen vs. Sophomores, Powderpuff (all girls), and Juniors vs. Seniors. Junior Reyli Salazar says he is excited to cheer on his house Hearts, on the sidelines, as this is a highly anticipated game with posters all around campus preparing students’ excitement for Friday.
