Students grateful to participate in coronation 

WE ARE SMILING — NRHEG Homecoming King Thor Routh and Queen Grace Tufte appear as though they are smling under their masks during Thursday night’s coronation. (Star Eagle photo by Chris Schlaak)

By DEB BENTLY
Contributing Writer

In more ways than not, last Thursday’s Homecoming coronation failed to meet “normal” expectations. Student Council advisor and the person in charge of planning the event, NRHEG teacher Barb Roesler, can list quite a few unusual features: “The students wore masks. The stage setup was very spread out and the floor of the gym was arranged so the candidates could remain socially distanced. We couldn’t have the choir or the band give any performances, and the audience was restricted to eight people for each candidate.”

But in every way that counted, it was a special event.

“Mrs. Roesler did a lot of planning and re-planning for us to be able to have coronation,” observes 2021 Homecoming King Thor Routh. “We were glad to be able to make it work.”

Had the 2020-21 school year been typical, Homecoming coronation would have probably taken place on September 21 or 28, according to Roesler. At that time, however, the Minnesota State High School League had announced that the football season would take place in the spring of 2021. In October, a decision was made to return the season to a more typical time frame, and Homecoming celebrations were scheduled for the week of November 9. That plan, too, had to be changed as the COVID pandemic began to pick up speed.

Over time, three separate dates were considered for coronation. The final selection, Nov. 19, was made rapidly when a small window of opportunity presented itself prior to the “pause” announced by Governor Walz and scheduled to begin on November 20.

“It took tremendous flexibility on the part of everyone involved,” says Roesler. “But it was important to the school and the community to give this group of candidates whatever bit of normalcy we could.”

Queen Grace Tufte observes that quite a few Homecoming traditions—including even the game itself—could not be scheduled. “It was hard to keep our spirits up,” she comments. “But I am grateful that so many people worked together to give us all they could.”