As many of you may know, “no” is not in my vocabulary when it comes to planning events. When our class president was nowhere to be found, I recently found myself amongst a group of old classmates from high school, working to plan our 10-year reunion. Planning a reunion can be somewhat of a daunting task, but with an organized group of go-getters, it can be done successfully.
We started by working to update every student’s address so a print invitation could be sent to each home. I designed the “day-planner” invitation using our school colors. We also created a Facebook group, a Twitter account and a website with all the appropriate information.
We were amazingly able to round-up approximately 200 people (almost half our class) to get together for this shindig. When entering the room, guests were greeted by a registration desk where they received a name tag including every student’s senior picture, designed to look similar to our old ID badges. The name tags were organized in wooden boxes painted with chalkboard paint.
The table was decorated with a table runner constructed out of old covers of our high school newspaper, The Westerner, along with scrapbook paper and yarn.
As if seeing 200 faces from ten years back wasn’t enough nostalgia for one night, we put together a display using wrapped boxes and wooden crates holding old items from high school events. Guests laughed and reminisced amongst pom poms, sports programs, phone books, playbills and other memorabilia.
Other fun additions to the evening included our senior video playing on flat screens throughout the venue and a playlist compiled of songs only from the years 1996-2000. So while rocking out to some Blink182, Puff Daddy, Eve6 and Savage Garden, we were able to put together a successful event!
Tips for planning a high school reunion:
Start early! It takes a long time to try to update addresses. We started only four months ahead of time and a few more months would have made it a little bit easier.
Pick a team with a wide range of talents. It is great to have minds of organization, technology, decorating, and people wrangling (this is not for everybody!)
Stay in communication with the invitees. Using various forms of media is a great way to assure you will relay your information to the greatest amount of people.
Have fun! You shouldn’t be on a reunion committee if you don’t have a little bit of fun doing it.
Get creative. Little touches often make the biggest difference.
Thanks to the fabulous reunion team of the Maine West Class of 2000 for such a fabulous event! See everyone in 2020! (or maybe 2015 if we get that ambitious).
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Class of 2000 – wow, I feel old! The reunion looks like it was a total success!
– Andrea (class of 1988)
HI, I’m currently planning my 10 year and was wondering how you did your name tags? Did you do it yourselves or go through a company? I love their look. Thanks, looks like you did a great job!
I was also wondering if you did any other activites during the night to make it more fun? thanks again!
Hi Alison! We did do the name tags ourselves. We scanned in the yearbook photos and went through and cropped them all and saved them to separate files. Then we set up a mail merge with the names and pictures so they inserted automatically. Takes some set up time but worth it in the end when you have 200 of them! We did a raffle and had our senior video on flat screens, but other than that, no real activities. Good luck with your planning!
What do you mean you set up a mail merge? My reunion is coming up on April 12th and i think this would be a cute idea. Please give me more info i would really appreciate it…
@Crystal – I wish I could give you the specific details, but I didn’t complete the task. In short, in Microsoft Word or other such programs, you can create a document using information imported from an excel or other data file. We used our previous data file and linked the photos into the merge, so with a few short clicks, it autofilled the whole thing. It takes a bit to set it up, but less time than making 400 individual badges. If you have a smaller reunion, you could just do them one by one in the label template in MS Word. Hope that helps!
I love your name badges. how did people wear them?
@Rose – Thanks! We printed them on adhesive labels, so they just wore them as stickers on their shirts!
Thanks for the cute idea about name badges! I love the idea of making it look like our student ID cards. So I have another question about them. What did you do for name tags for alumni spouses/guests? Just a generic “Hello my name is” sticker? I’m thinking I might even put ours in plastic clip holders so I don’t really want to buy double of those, plus it seems weird to make a “guest of Jane Doe” label for their guests… trying to find out what others have done. Thanks!!