To Build A Prom

Class Representatives Reveal Prom-Planning Process

The sun is setting. Students clad in tuxedos and dresses of all shapes, sizes, and colors pose for pictures, their eyes wrinkling at the corners from their wide smiles. Girls, in particular, make sure to focus on the corsages that cover their wrists, intent on not messing them up before the dance. After photos, they pile into their cars and head to a fancy dinner. They feel like royalty in their nice, formal wear. Then, they head to the dance. The night is perfect.


    What the students fail to notice, though, are their peers who greeted them at the door, checking off their names before they entered the dance hall. The ones who, unbeknownst by their fellow classmates, showed up hours early to oversee final preparations. The ones who spent three years fundraising and planning for their peers’ “perfect night”. The class representatives of 2019.


    The 2019 class reps is an organization that holds a very important task: to plan and fund their junior year prom. The process they go through in order to successfully organize a prom is extensive and tedious, giving the class officers and representatives a multitude of obstacles to overcome in order to follow through with their commitment. In addition to having to plan and raise thousands of dollars for prom, the representatives also face another burden: the approval of their classmates.


    “To be truthfully honest, people are always going to find something wrong with any particular event,” said Meghan Hunt, Class President of 2019. “There’s always going to be flaws, but hopefully we are minimizing them.”


    The stages to planning a successful prom have proven to be demanding to the class reps. They include: electing officers, finding and choosing fundraisers, raising money, and coming up with a theme. With the process taking almost three years, the representatives are almost able to breathe a sigh of relief after a long period of planning and fundraising.


“It has honestly been such a long process that I don’t remember half the steps we took!” Hunt said.
    The 2019 class reps have been raising money to fund prom since 2015. The expenses expected to be covered with the money raised include: the venue (Alzafar Shrine), the decorator, security, a DJ, a photographer, food, etc. Together, these costs make up a sum of about $30,000. When Hunt and her fellow officers and reps first were told the amount of money they needed to raise, they were quite overwhelmed. However, they knew that in order to reach their goal, they needed to get started immediately.


“We’ve been fundraising since freshman year, so there’s been a lot of different events,” Hunt said. “We sold popcorn freshman and sophomore year, and then junior year we took over the class office store and sold candy, chips, and drinks. Also, the tickets for prom have brought in a lot of revenue.”


The prom-planning process has been made significantly easier with the help of faculty, staff, and other students. In addition to Hunt, other class reps members and officers also played major roles in executing the required steps needed in order to make this year’s prom worth-while.
“Many people have helped out!” Hunt said. “We have our officers: Madison Edwards, Catherine Gideon, Joey Guerra, and Joy Dyer. In addition to those officers, are officers from 2017 Madeline; Sturdivant and Julia Jachimowicz were super helpful. Also, one of our representatives named Zoë Hewitt has been a tremendous help! She’s always helping out whenever we need her! Also, none of this could have happened without the help of Ms. Sanchez and Mrs. Mumme.”


Ultimately, the class representatives of 2019 hope that they are able to give their fellow classmates a prom to be proud of. Despite the trials and tribulations they needed to overcome, they are excited to see the finished product, as well as witnessing the reactions of their peers.


“I really hope that everyone has a lot of fun, and enjoys themselves,” Hunt said. “I also want the officers and everyone else to see their hard work paid off!”

Madison Edwards
Contributor