On February 25, San Dimas High School had its first ever No Hate Assembly, which is put on by the No Hate Tour, an educational organization that travels to many schools around the nation to have professional BMX bikers do wild tricks while speaking out on their experiences on bullying, and how to put a stop to it. This year, thanks to the school’s mental health specialist Ms. Zuniga, the No Hate Tour came to the San Dimas High School gym and gave a rally the saints will never forget.

After 4th period, all the students gathered at the gym excited to see what the rally held for them. Upon entering in, there was music, spirit, and a ramp set in the middle of the building for the bikers to use on for their tricks. Then, the assembly started, the host picks up the microphone, gets the gym even more hyped, and talked about his experience growing up a little shorter than boys his age, and how he was picked on for it. As he continued his story, the students were all moved by it feeling emotional that he had to grow up dealing with bullying, but now, he is a part of an organization that gets to travel nationwide to showcase professional biking in schools.

After the host’s speech, the action finally started. Three BMX bikers got on their bikes, rode across the gym, and got on the ramps and did impressive flips that wowed the gym audience. The bikers did flips, spins, and some even did impressive poses when their bike was in the air and above the ramp. Throughout all the tricks, the saints were cheering, screaming, and loving everything the bikers were doing, displaying their enjoyment for the assembly. Senior Gage Nusbaum who attended the rally expressed his thoughts as “pretty cool seeing them do backflips of the bike, and I also like seeing the pull ups,” proving he was deeply entertained by the No Hate Assembly.

Then, the host announced to the students in the bleachers to shout a teacher they want to see go on the top of the ramp for the bikers to do their tricks over them, and the majority of the students shouted AP Calculus and Statistics teacher Mr. Kim to do it. Hence, Mr. Kim went on the top of the ramp, sitting on a chair that was placed there, nervous, but excited to see what happens, and wait for what the bikers were going to do. Luckly, the bikers did an excellent job with flipping over Mr. Kim and not causing him any injuries.

Mr. Kim got off the ramp, the bikers did more tricks, and then, they announced a pull up challenge using a pull up bar by the Marines. A couple students tried it out, and it was challenging for some, but all that mattered was how brave the students were to take a risk and put themselves out there.

The No Hate Assembly was planned by mental health specialist Ms. Zuniga, and according to her, she stated, “They’ve been asking me for a few years now to do this on campus, the program itself. Unfortunately, there’s times where, for some reason, we have more fights than others, and so I felt it was appropriate to bring it on campus to really promote anti-bullying,” demonstrating Ms. Zuniga’s purpose for putting on the  assembly, “and it got the kids to be engaged and wanting to participate, not just a talk.” Moreover, due to Ms. Zuniga being driven to put a stop to bullying at San Dimas, she was able to put on a successful rally for the students to learn and remember.

So, the first ever No Hate Assembly at San Dimas High School proven itself to make change on campus when it took a higher step into counteracting bullying and how to stop it, by giving a show for the saints to be excited and thrilled but still learning how to deal with bullying.