As the University prepares to celebrate its 100th Homecoming, the Homecoming Court is expanding eligibility requirements to include members from all classifications.Amelia Burns, chair of the Homecoming Committee, said this year’s events will be beefed up to mark the 100th anniversary.”The whole thing is a 100-year celebration, and everything is bigger,” Burns said. “But the biggest difference this year is the court.”Homecoming Court eligibility has been limited to juniors and seniors in the past. But only 12 credit hours are required to apply this year, opening the court to freshmen and sophomores, said Katelyn Leonard, chair of the Homecoming Court Committee.”We need a spotlight not only on seniors,” Leonard said. “We have freshmen, sophomores and juniors who have done amazing things they need to be spotlighted for.” Hannah Larkin, accounting sophomore, said having members of her class on the Homecoming Court would probably make her pay more attention to the court.”It makes things more open, and more people will probably apply because they want that recognition,” Larkin said.Megan McAdams, kinesiology sophomore, said court membership should be left to upperclassmen because they have been at the University longer and have had more time to get involved.”I would let a junior or senior get it before me,” McAdams said. Classifications will be kept in mind while applicants are being judged, Burns said.”A freshman isn’t going to be judged against a senior’s involvement,” Burns said. “They’ve only been here 12 hours.”Seniors are still the only applicants eligible for king and queen, Leonard said.”Since this is such a big change, we wanted to keep the tradition that senior court members are eligible for king and queen,” Leonard said.Another change is student voting on the court will be limited to choosing the king and queen, Burns said. Students voted on all members of the court in the past.This year’s court will have 14 members, Leonard said, including three senior couples, two junior couples, one sophomore couple and one freshman couple.Full-time students are eligible for Homecoming Court if they have at least 12 credit hours, a 2.5 GPA in the last regular semester and a 2.5 GPA overall. Applications are available online at www.homecoming.lsu.edu and are due Oct. 19.–Contact Ryan Buxton at [email protected]