Early Tuesday morning, faculty and staff from all eight schools in the Gainesville City School System filled the stands at Gainesville High School to celebrate the beginning of a new school year. Employees from each school were dressed in matching T-shirts with their school’s name on them. They competed in games in which they passed a hula hoop around in a circle without using their hands, had a paper airplane contest that saw one fly the length of the gym floor, worked to see who could get out of a “knot” of team members the fastest and built structures using spaghetti noodles, tape and marshmallows. A variety of door prizes were given away in drawings, and the employees earned from $100 to $1,000 for their schools based on their standings in the games. Gainesville Exploration Academy won the $1,000 prize. The school system’s Big Red Rally was an opportunity to bring the schools together and give a visual representation to the district’s “One Gainesville” mantra, according to Superintendent Jeremy Williams.