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Alum, Melanie Vance and 2008 graduate, Amanda Craig get ready to celebrate Cinco de Mayo festivities.
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The annual celebration began at Grayson in the spring of 2003 and has become a tradition since then. The fifth of May is full of student energy, cultural enrichment, and dancing. Back in 2003, five Spanish teachers, Holly Brodnax, Jennifer Koleff, Allison Sprayberry, Laura Story [now Droms) and Heather Wright collaborated to plan a day of cultural enrichment away from the textbooks. Holly Brodnax says, “We wanted to spend the whole day together celebrating and sharing culture with our students.”
“The idea was that we would take our classes to the theater for an informational presentation followed by singing, dancing, and games,” she continues. Frontera sponsored the event by providing t-shirts and free cheese dip coupons as prizes. For the past three years, Grayson’s Spanish Club has hosted the event and their officers have planned the activities. Each Spanish class is invited to the Grayson’s black box theater for one class period of Cinco de Mayo fun.
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Graduates, Taylor Pitts and Amanda Craig lead classes in The Baila de Queso.
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The most exciting event of the day’s celebration is the "Baile de Queso" translated as “The Cheese Dance.” Grayson alumni seem to sneek back in every year to join in the festivities and lead the dances
Broadnax adds, “We discovered the dance through the Prentice Hall video series "La Catrina" and made it our own.”
Every year songs and games are changed up. Some of the songs include, "Fotografia" by Juanes, "Ave Maria" by David Bisbal, "Hoy" by Gloria Estefan, and "La Copa de Vida" by Ricky Martin. The first year, students sang along with the lyrics on the screen. Since then, music videos have been incorporated. Some of the games include the Mexican jumping bean race (a relay similar to a sack race), a sombrero relay, a flag contest, and the running of the bulls.
This year there was a presentation of several traditional Mexican dances by the participants of Grayson's International Night. Brodnax concludes, “It’s a chaotic day every year, but a lot of fun!”
