By Dawnielle Floyd |Staff Writer|

Hundreds of community members and students gathered on the CSUSB lawn to watch over 20 floats parade down to the Coussoulis Arena in celebration of 50 years of higher education.

Preparation for the Homecoming celebration started back in November, when the entire campus and community were invited by the Alumni Association to come enjoy and participate in the festivities this past weekend.

“Asking the campus and organizations to participate was fairly easy, asking the community was a little harder, we had to rely on word of mouth,” said Alex Spencer from the alumni department.

CSUSB campus played a huge part in the celebration, our mascot Cody the Coyote, and many other departments such as the Nursing, Student Housing, and the Student Rec and Wellness Center participated.

Each float was uniquely decorated and different from the next.

The Department of Nursing  float looked like an ambulance, decorated in white and red with a banner that read “Nurses Rock!”

“The ambulance idea came about because it’s our job to save a life so we looked at it as nurses to the rescue,” said Kathy Tiras

Student Housing created a banner that stated, “up down, all around housing is the best in town,” encouraging the crowd to support on-campus living.

Following the banner was the float with two big coyote ears covered in blue sticky notes and blue and white balloons with the names of the housing complexes available on campus.

“Our theme was based off of the schools theme of the year. As a whole, we worked from that idea and continued with our crazy CSUSB spirit. We reflected our ideas off of each other and combined them all to create one giant coyote mascot to represent our school spirit,” stated Zoe Holeman of the AV council.

The community showed up in a huge way as well, with a popular local drill team and drum line called San Bernardino Pacesetters (SBP), with their great tunes and dance moves. 

The SBP set the bar high with their ladies dressed in a silver and black uniform and the men in black and grey shirts in support of San Bernardino.

The celebration after parade, down on center court of the arena.

Crystal Wymer and the Alumni Association worked closely with CSUSB favorite local businesses to make sure everything ran successfully.

With 11 food vendors, and additional help from locations on campus like the bookstore and health center, there was tons of free fun to go around.

Guests were able to watch the show, and after follow the parade to the Coussoulis Arena, where they could find food, from places like El Tortio, and Lucille’s Smokehouse Bar-B-Que, a jump house for the kids, and for those 21 and over, a beer and wine garden.

“Alumni Association worked closely with campus events and campus police to follow correct procedures,” stated Wymer, in order to provide a wonderful selection of alcohol in the beer and wine garden.

The Harkins Theater, which will be opening in spring, came to show their support and gave away popcorn and vouchers for the concession stand when patrons visit. 

This year’s Homecoming celebration was fun for everyone from the photo booth, to the bounce house and the beer and wine garden, leaving us looking forward to future ones to come.