Stone Mountain High School host Spirit Night for community

Stone Mountain High School is trying to bring the community back into the school.

The school hosted a community spirit night on Dec. 11, featuring basketball games against Atlanta’s Booker T. Washington High School. The event included a pre-game East vs. West All-Star Game, giveaways and an award ceremony for basketball player Danielle Clark, who reached a milestone on Nov. 23 when she exceeded 1,000 points in her career.

Students from Stone Mill and Stone Mountain elementary schools were on the East team and Hambrick and Rockbridge elementary schools were on the West team. The four schools are feeder schools to Stone Mountain High.

Stone Mountain girls head basketball coach Stanley Clark said the goal for the event was to bring all the students from the feeder schools under one roof.

“We had a good turn out,” he said. “The kids enjoyed themselves and we’re looking forward to big things happening again in the community in the future.”

Before he began coaching at the school seven years ago, Clark said, Stone Mountain was a big community school.

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“[Stone Mountain] had big involvement [from the community],” he said. “So, what we’re trying to do is get the parents to see that Stone Mountain is a good school that you can send your kid to. And, we’re trying to bring everybody here so they can see that for themselves.”

School assistant principal Jeffrey Tarver said it was important to have an event like this for the younger students and for the community.

“It’s important to involve kids at an early level because if we can reach them at an early level they will bring more participation,” Tarver said. “You always want to involve the community in whatever you’re doing in the school because the community cannot live apart from the school.”

The spirit night ended with both the Pirates and Lady Pirates winning. The Lady Pirates defeated Washington 64-22 and the Pirates won 86-67.