SCA, Students Prep For Prom

As the spring season begins, the annual pre-prom stress begins to overwhelm the junior and senior classes.

“Obviously, two months before prom, girls are already freaking out about promposals,” senior Jeanette Yan said. Besides finding a date, there are dresses to try on, tuxedos to rent, reservations to be made, and gatherings to organize.

The planning that goes into the before prom night events is usually done by one or two students in a friend group, which Yan describes as “super, super stressful.”

“It’s so hard to get organized for pictures and food… parking space, wherever we go for pictures or someone’s house. It’s just always hard for parking space for 30 people,” Yan said.

“Trying to figure out how many people you can invite is definitely a struggle because you feel like if you don’t invite some people they’ll be upset, if you invite too many people space is an issue,” Yan said on the issue of “being inclusive but also exclusive because of limited numbers.”

Yan has also faced the ordeal of working out the timing for getting ready, eating dinner, and taking pictures all before it gets dark.

As juniors and seniors work out their pre-prom night timing, SCA’s eleventh grade class has been planning prom since their freshman year.

This is a fact that SCA Vice President junior Kai Milner thinks many students do not know, but definitely should. The three year task of planning and fundraising for prom starts with SCA seniors giving “around $500 to the freshmen as a gift every single year” as well as assisting them in various fundraisers.

Milner explains the main reason why it takes three years to organize prom is the cost of the location: to rent the DoubleTree ballroom space is around $10,000. The $20 tickets for prom mostly go towards this cost, along with fundraisers, but funding also goes towards the various decorations.

This year’s theme is inspired by the recent Disney movie Into the Woods; therefore, Milner says decorations will be very nature based and there will be lots of flowers and greenery.

“We’re going to try and make some cool sets behind [a photography station at prom], so we’ve been talking to Art Honor Society and different groups to see what type of sets we can set up,” Milner said.

SCA Class President junior Jacqueline Hoege is also reaching out to Pingyi Zhu, president of Art Honor Society, for “coming up with ticket designs and decorations” and “just kind of how the place should look and what kind of things we can create.”

Hoege has had experience with planning and running weddings, so she has applied her knowledge of large events to the coordinating of prom.

Her work has helped with the time management of when to hit certain deadlines for bookings and ordering food. “We had to start really early on booking the DJ since prom is right in the wedding season and they [DJs] get booked up really quickly,” Hoege said.

The music for prom has also changed in one aspect this year: official song requests. Through an online Google form, SCA is taking requests for songs that they will pass onto this year’s DJ.

“The song list requests are actually a big thing we’re doing this year,” Hoege. “Students can actually request songs ahead of time and not just the night of [prom], so they can walk in and actually hear songs that they really enjoy.”

Prom will be at the DoubleTree Hotel on April 18, at 8 p.m.