Encourage school spirit, appeal to current and former students and get people excited: these are all things the homecoming theme must accomplish.

“Don’t Stop BG’ing” is this year’s homecoming theme – a theme Jodi Webb, senior associate dean of students and chair of the University homecoming committee, said is catchy and well-liked.

“People like it because it appeals to current students, but it also appeals to alumni,” Webb said. “We want something that’s going to be upbeat, and get people excited and to want to get involved with homecoming.”

The creation of a homecoming theme is a process that begins in January, when the University committee typically forms.

“The first thing we do is we really start to look at trying to develop the theme,” Webb said.

Brainstorming theme ideas is the first step of the process, and Webb said students do a large part of the idea generating.

The University homecoming committee has a wide range of members, including students, faculty, staff, someone from each academic college, campus operations and more.

There is also a homecoming committee made purely of students. The student steering committee is composed of five committee chairs and a director, and it is guided by a graduate student adviser and a staff adviser. Volunteers and members of each chair’s committee also help think of ideas for a theme.

Shawn Gilbert, marketing and promotions chair in the student committee, said the student committee brainstorms a huge list of theme ideas and then discusses the ideas.

“We weighed out the negatives and positives of each and narrowed it down to the top few,” Gilbert said.

When narrowing down the theme list, the students think about how each idea can relate to students and be carried through in the parade, or on a T-shirt, said Rachel Rosenthal, director of the student steering committee for homecoming.

“We want something people like and catch onto,” Rosenthal said. “We want a different variation in interpretation, something that can be taken many different ways.”

When the students are brainstorming ideas, Gilbert said they take alumni and current students into account.

“It has to be something both alumni and current students can connect with,” Gilbert said. “We want it to be something people can really play off of and get into.”

Webb said this year’s theme works because of how it relates to the song “Don’t Stop Believin'” by Journey.

“It’s an older song but it’s been in the media in the last few years, and students know it because of the Glee remake,” Webb said. “We want something that’s positive and upbeat and something that people can relate to.”

Rosenthal said the theme is easy and relatable, because people tend to sing along to the Journey song, replacing “Believin'” with “BG’ing”.

“We took something that was already a part of the campus culture,” Rosenthal said.

Gilbert said the committee wanted to use that song because everyone is familiar with it, and the committee wanted to make it have a Bowling Green meaning.

“[Students] can relate to the theme because after graduation, they keep BGSU pride and carry it on to the real world,” Gilbert said.

Once the student committee picks its top few choices, it sends the choices to the University committee, who then picks the theme.

“I feel like we have a lot of flexibility with what we pick,” Webb said.

Webb said “Don’t Stop BG’ing” was by far the most popular option when the committee voted.

“This year the theme is catchy; I’ve heard a lot of people referring to it,” Webb said.

The theme was finalized in March this year.

Once the theme is finalized, the committees start working on incorporating it into homecoming activities.

“We try to incorporate it where we can to try and add fun to the week,” Webb said. “The Falcon marching band will perform some Journey songs and ‘Don’t Stop Believin” at the pep rally.”

The goal with the theme is to get more people to love the University, become involved and be inspired by homecoming, Rosenthal said. They also look to reach out to first year students and tie them into the University.

“The theme is something that ties everything we want to do together,” Gilbert said.