DOWAGIAC — Whether they are dressed in their pajamas in the middle of class, passing around a baby bottle using only their feet or riding atop a holiday-themed float, Dowagiac Union High School students want to demonstrate that there is truly no place like homecoming.

In preparation for Friday night’s game between The Chieftains and the Sturgis Trojans, students at the high school have participated in a number of activities to show off their Orange and Black spirit during the annual Homecoming Week. The festivities come to ahead at 5 p.m. Friday, when the school hosts its traditional Homecoming parade.

A procession of different vehicles and marchers — including a series of decorative floats created by each of the high school classes — will make their way through the streets of Dowagiac, starting in front of the high school on West Prairie Ronde Street and ending at the front gates of Chris Taylor Alumni Field on Spruce Street. Each class’ float will represent a different holiday: seniors based on Halloween, juniors based on Christmas, sophomores based on St. Patrick’s Day and freshmen based on Thanksgiving.

Each float will be judged by a panel of teachers, with the winning class receiving points toward school’s “spirit stick” competition going on this week for Homecoming, said DUHS English teacher Dustin Cornelius, who is advising the student committee in charge of planning this week’s festivities.

Local law enforcement and fire department vehicles will also participate in the parade, as well as several high school and junior teams, contestants in the 2017 homecoming king and queen competition, Miss Dowagiac, school administrators and others.

The parade is just one of many ways the high school class is celebrating Homecoming this week, with this year’s theme being “there is no place like Homecoming.”

Throughout the week, students were asked to dress up, with different days representing a different take on the word “home.” For example, on Monday, students were asked to “make yourself at home” by dressing up in their pajamas, while on Wednesday, they celebrated by the “home of the brave” by wearing red, white and blue.

Teachers have kept track of how many students in each class dressed up, which will also go toward the points for the “spirit stick” competition.

“Right now, the seniors are ahead, but they are barely ahead of the sophomores,” Cornelius said. “It’s pretty competitive.”

The remaining points will be decided during a pep rally on Friday, where the classes will compete against in each other in a series of challenges, including tug of war, balloon toss and a game called “baby feet,” where the students must use their feet to pass a baby bottle between each other, Cornelius said.

This year’s festivities were organized members of the high school student senate, led by a leadership committee consisting of four seniors and a junior, Cornelius said. They have been preparing for the event since the beginning of the school year, and have reached out to people across the community for assistance with float building, vehicles for the parade and more, the teacher said.

“They are doing stuff that I didn’t learn until I was in college,” he said. “They are calling businesses, organizing committees. I had no idea how in depth it was until I began advising them.”

During the game, the school will announce the Senior Homecoming King and Queen, who were voted by their classmates during a poll earlier this week, Cornelius said. The festivities end on Saturday evening, when the school hosts a Homecoming dance outside the cafeteria courtyard.

Given the amount of work the students have poured into Homecoming week, Cornelius asked families to line the streets Friday to watch the parade and cheer on the students as they participate in one of the best parts of their high school lives.

“I always tell my students, ‘This is a special time in your life, that you will never get back. You need to seize every opportunity you can while you’re here, because after these four years are done, they’re gone,’” he said. “To them seize them is one of the most rewarding parts about being a teacher.”