The STA and Sion rivalry has gone too far.

The fighting between the schools has leaked beyond our sports arenas and academic fields and has taken a whole new life. It is malicious, it is wrong, and frankly, it is a little hypocritical.

STA prides itself on loving ‘neighbor to neighbor without distinction,’ but did we ever consider that our neighbors might extend beyond our own campus? It is hypocritical of us to take such pride in our motto when we stop treating our own sister school with decency. And yes, they are our sister school.

We are both all-girl, college preparatory, Catholic institutions. We are founded on the same beliefs of education, service and respect. Honestly, we are almost the same school. There are more things that unite us than break us apart.

So why do many STA students maintain that we are completely different schools? What are the main criticisms of Sion at STA? According to comments made on Facebook after STA played Sion earlier this year, the main criticisms of Sion were:

one, the school has a cheerleading squad

and two, the students are promiscuous.

To address this first criticism, we can’t judge Sion for having cheerleaders when STA itself is considering creating a squad. We should not judge Sion for being proactive about having a group of people to cheer at every game, not just the ones the spirit club decides to promote. It is incredibly unfair to judge an entire school based on one group of girls.

And as for the second criticism, the verbal and written attacks at Sion for being promiscuous are completely malicious.

To any girls from Sion reading this, please do not make the same mistake that girls at STA did. Please do not judge STA based on the ill-informed and prejudiced remarks of a small group of students. We promise to try to do the same. You are not a school of promiscuous cheerleaders, just as we are not a school of ignorant brats.

To any STA students reading this, stop. Clean your Facebook of the rude remarks. Clean your mouths with a bar of soap before you go to a Sion game. And to both schools, remember what this rivalry is really about.

STA and Sion used to push each other to succeed both athletically and academically. We cheered our hearts out to support our teams. We united as a school to better our communities. Sion was the reason we pushed ourselves to the limit studying or practicing or helping others.

Sion is not hindering us, they are helping us to be our best.

So while we post defamatory and ignorant remarks on Facebook or shout choice words at Sion fans after a volleyball game, we need to look at what this rivalry has actually done for STA over the years.

So, although we may scream that we like to eat “Sion meat” raw, raw, raw, during volleyball games, what we really want to say is thanks. And we’re sorry.