Michael forces scaled-back homecoming at ASU

ALBANY — The Albany State University campus was quiet on Thursday.

Students came back to campus on Wednesday, a week after being forced to evacuate ahead of Hurricane Michael, and campus life has taken a slow turn toward normalcy. There was nothing normal, though, about the absence Thursday of on-campus pageantry, which has long been a part of homecoming week at the university.

Citing recovery efforts on the ASU campus and, indeed, throughout the city, President Marion Fedrick announced earlier this week that Albany State would significantly scale back the weeklong celebration. Removed from the schedule were a fundraising gala, a downtown street party and the homecoming parade, which annually draws thousands to the city’s downtown district.

“Thankfully, the region was gifted with hundreds of extra utility technicians to assist with restoring power, water and phone lines,” Fedrick said in a letter to alumni and supporters. “The influx of technicians, in addition to power and water outages, has placed a strain on an already devastated city. This means our hotels, restaurants and other amenities are stretched to the limit.

“Our local hotels will need to cancel many of the current homecoming reservations in order to accommodate the sheer number of heroes arriving to Albany to help restore the Good Life City. As president of ASU, I back those cancellations 100 percent. We must get our community back in shape. We are one Albany, and we support this community, which is the ASU community.”

Even with the scaled-back homecoming celebration and reminders of Michael’s wrath all over the campus and in the city, the mood on the university’s campus Thursday was upbeat.

“Student morale is amazing,” Student Activities Advisory Board President Danisha Gray said. “It’s definitely building back up. The students were a little crushed by, of course, having to cancel half of homecoming. But we came back, and we’re excited to have homecoming and then to help the community also.

“The students are excited to just be back together again with something so tragically happening, and then our football team recently winning a game against Morehouse. That was a great win; they had not practiced all week due to the weather. We’re just excited and we’re excited about what’s to come.”

Albany State officials worked hard behind the scenes to plan as many homecoming events as possible for students in the wake of the storm. Asked how long it took for the Student Activities Advisory Board to get the homecoming preparations back on track, Gray said the response was “immediate.”

“I want to say the day afterwards, we were up making sure everyone who was in those positions were OK, making sure our students were good. We were up and at it — planning,” she said.

The ASU Student Government Association hosted a homecoming kickoff rally on Wednesday evening, and events planned for Thursday included a game tournament and a coronation ceremony. Friday’s events include the Homecoming Convocation and pep rally and a performance by DJ Battle and Cypher.

Game day on Saturday begins with the ASU Day of Service from 8 a.m-noon, during which all students are encouraged to participate in activities that give back to the community. A “Hurricane Relief Block Party” is planned on campus from noon-6 p.m. The homecoming football game, in which the Golden Rams take on the Clark Atlanta Panthers, will be held at 2 p.m. That game was moved to Hugh Mills Stadium due to damage to the on-campus Albany State College Coliseum.

“(The ASU Day of Service) is our opportunity to give back to the community, so those (student) stakeholders will be dispersed into the Albany-Dougherty County community to assist with various community service projects,” A.L. Fleming, the school’s vice president of institutional advancement, said.

“(Most service-related activities will be) specifically for storm restoration,” Danyelle Gary, the university’s interim director of media relations, added. “We understand there are a lot of needs still in this community, so our students and our faculty and staff — but especially our students — wanted to show that we are a part of this city. So they wanted to get out and really put their hands on something.”

For interested game-day revelers, although the game has been moved off the ASU campus, there is still an opportunity for tailgating away from Hugh Mills Stadium.

“We also want to highlight the changes for our game because we won’t be on this campus,” Gary said. “Logistically, there are some changes, so we want to make sure the community members that have been involved in our process in the past, or have done those things in the past, know where to go and what to do. Because we still are allowing people to tailgate on campus even though the game will be at Hugh Mills.”