The Athletics Department launched a new initiative called “We the Jury’ this past Friday, aiming to increase campus-wide spirit at sporting events.

According to a Sept. 5 email from Assistant Vice President for Health and Wellness, Director of Athletics, Physical Education and Recreation Sheryl Sousa ’90 to the student body, the new program is “designed to recognize and reward your school spirit.”

The email invited students to attend this past weekend’s women’s volleyball game where the Athletics Department “inagurate[d] “We the Jury” and welcome[d] new head coach Alesia Vaccari.”

Sousa’s email also encouraged students to continue the program’s kickoff at Saturday’s women’s soccer game, women’s volleyball matches and men’s soccer game.

With the program, students who attend home sporting events are awarded points that can be used to redeem rewards and prizes throughout the course of the year.

Sousa’s email explained that the program is “a yearlong promotional program that involves all 19 Brandeis varsity teams and rewards students for their attendance at home events.”

The program launched this past weekend with opportunities for students to collect points at the three home women’s volleyball games, a women’s soccer contest and a men’s soccer game, all of which were attended by at least 100 people, according to the Athletics website.

Point totals accumulated throughout the year from varsity sporting events can be tracked through the “We the Jury” online portal, accessible via the official athletics website.  

The system rewards a various numbers of points to participants based off the event attended.

Participants earn one point for both men’s and women’s home basketball games and two points for home baseball games, softball games, soccer games and official bus trips.

Three points can be earned by participants who attend volleyball games, track and field meets, tennis matches, fencing tournaments and swimming and diving meets. 

Participants can add four points to their cumulative totals by attending special “Jury Duty” events, to be announced periodically on the official Athletics Facebook and Twitter pages.

In addition, bonus points can be earned from special announcements on the athletics’ various social media outlets, including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. 

Rewards for attending sporting events and collecting points will be distributed to participants intermediately throughout the course of the school year.

According to the “We the Jury” website, a grand prize will be awarded to the participant with the most total points upon the conclusion of the athletic year.

The “We the Jury” website also includes a calendar of upcoming sporting events and a list of prizes available, but no prizes have been listed so far.

The website registered the top 100 participants after Saturday afternoon’s men’s soccer game—a 4-1 victory over the Bridgewater State University Bears. 

Both the men’s soccer and women’s volleyball teams registered season highs in attendance this past weekend according to game logs.

Participants will have an opportunity to add to their point totals this weekend with home games hosted by both the men