AACC’s mascot, Swoop, turns 10 this year, and creator Ben Pierce, a senior graphic designer, said he “still get[s] a kick out of seeing it.”
Pierce, who works in Strategic Communications, recalled working with a team to narrow down the kind of bird Swoop would become before putting it out for a vote among students, faculty, staff and alumni.
Among the choices were seagulls, osprey, riverhawks and blue herons. “We tried to pick birds that are native to the area,” Pierce said.
The community chose a riverhawk and named it Swoop, which Pierce’s team designed with the colors of AACC Athletics: teal and white with patches of navy and gray, plus a huge yellow beak. AACC calls its athletes the Riverhawks.
Then, the college contracted with the vendor who had created mascot costumes for a number of area sports teams.
The faux fur-covered, six-foot-tall mascot appears at campus sports games and events and in some local parades. The big bird’s handlers—those who wear the costume—keep their identities secret.
Pierce said he attended Swoop’s first birthday party in 2016, which featured games, a giant birthday cake and dancing on the Quad.
“Swoop was out there dancing, doing the wobble,” Pierce said.
For the mascot’s 10th birthday, Pierce and others in Strategic Communications created a commemorative logo, showing an illustrated side profile of the bird and the words, “the rise of the Riverhawks” and “10 years of Swoop.”
Before Swoop came to life in 2016, AACC athletes, whose colors were red, white and blue, were the Pioneers and had no mascot. Pierce said the Student Government Association and some student athletes approached him to suggest that the college update the school’s nickname and create a mascot.
“The Riverhawk identity and Swoop, that was all kind of developed, you know, with athletics in mind,” Pierce said.
Pierce, who emphasized he was part of a team and not a solo designer, said creating Swoop is “something I felt I poured a lot of time and energy into, and seeing that it was embraced [was] definitely a really good feeling.”
But Pierce said the team created more than a school mascot.
“I’m feeling like we helped create more of a sense of community with that Riverhawks identity,” Pierce said. “You know, I feel like we’re all Riverhawks.”
