V-Day @GA: All Heart

Candygrams, hallway decorations, pink and red civvies day, two different rose sales — this year GA is going all in for Valentine’s Day.

The most exciting news? Candygrams are back! If you don’t know, candygrams are small messages you can send to another student on Valentine’s Day. Typically, Forum sends out a Google form where you enter your message and intended recipient, and they send those notes off to advisories where they are distributed to the intended student. The last time GA participated in candygrams was back in 2021, and things were a bit of a mess…

Two years ago, students at both GA and Brunswick could send notes to one another. Like you would expect, both schools got a little carried away, and many candygrams became filled with jokes and drama. To ease the chaos, candygrams went on pause in 2022. Fortunately, they’re making a comeback this year, with a few changes.

First and foremost, candygrams are no longer an activity in collaboration with Brunswick. Additionally, Forum will be reading all of the notes to make sure nothing inappropriate or mean is said. Although this change disappointed some students, everyone can agree on one big improvement: This year, candygrams come with–wait for it– actual candy!

This Valentine’s weekend, Forum will be hard at work printing the notes, cutting them out, and packing them with some delicious treats.

A second Valentine’s Day tradition that will be spreading holiday cheer throughout the school is the rose sale, an annual event that occurs at both GA and Brunswick. At GA, students can fill out a Google form to purchase one, six, or 12 roses. Sponsored by the Gender Sexuality Alliance Club, the proceeds from GA’s rose sale go to the Trevor Project, a nonprofit organization that works to support LGBTQ+ youth. After purchasing your roses, GA students can pick up their roses on Tuesday and decide which lucky students to hand them out to throughout the day.

Meanwhile, Brunswick’s rose sale is quite different. First, Brunswick students fill out a Google form in which they specify which individual they want a rose to be delivered to. This makes the rose-giving much more personalized, as well as comic and potentially confusing, since students can send roses on behalf of others. Second, these roses get passed out individually to their intended (or unintended) recipients—sometimes (and much to the chagrin of teachers at both schools) in the middle of class. While there are many differences between the rose sales at the two schools, there will certainly be no shortage of Valentine’s Day excitement.

Thanks to lively decorations, the return of candygrams, and the intricacies of rose giving, Valentine’s Day is officially back after a few let-down COVID years.