USF President Judy Genshaft wants you to know it’s Homecoming this year if you step on campus during Homecoming week.

That’s why she’s tasked the Homecoming Steering Committee with making sure Homecoming is more memorable this year.

Bill McCausland, director for the Alumni Association and part of the 18-member committee, said this year, the annual week-long event from Oct. 21-26 will have a different feel to it.

“Over the past few years here at USF, Homecoming has been … OK,” he said. “OK. The students have done a pretty good job, we haven’t done a great job from an alumni standpoint and faculty and staff can get more involved too.”

CJ Vila, a coordinator at the Center for Student Involvement, said though the university is looking for greater involvement in planning for the week from alumni, faculty and staff, the source of funding remains the student-paid Activity and Service (A&S) fee allocation of $418,229 for the steering committee and $42,000 for a Homecoming Grant —
$12,659 more than was allocated last year.

Vila said more information will be announced closer to the date of Homecoming week, including the lineup for the Homecoming Parade After Party, which featured Ludacris last year.

McCausland said nine colleges will be hosting welcome back events for alumni of the college and a luncheon will be hosted for faculty and staff alumni.

He also said the parade will change its route to involve more people, including going past dorms on Holly. The pep rally, he said, will be pushed to later in the day so more students, faculty and staff are available to participate. He also encouraged faculty and staff at the last Faculty Senate meeting to wear “spirit colors” during the week and asked for their assistance in getting more people involved.

“Your assistance would be greatly appreciated,” he said. “One thing I would ask you to consider, and we can’t require you to do this by any means, but we want the students to be involved in as many activities as possible, so if it’s a little bit lighter week and there’s not as many tests or papers due that week, that would be great so we can have as many students participating as possible.”

McCausland said he thinks the campus will look different during the week as well, through additional decorations.

“I want people to know something special is going on at USF,” he said.