Prom Night: The City is Ours

For the past few months at , there has been one thing on everyone’s mind: Prom.

Students have focused on finding the perfect dress, arranging limos and other transportation and, possibly most importantly, finding and asking a date to prom.

This year many students have gone above and beyond in thinking of creative ways to ask each other to prom.

One senior, Phuong Tran, received cupcakes with the different letters of the word “Prom.” One cupcake arrived for her in every class she attended until she had the full word “Prom,” with a question mark at the end of it.

Other people elected to take the traditional route by giving flowers and a card to the person they wanted to ask to prom.

Junior Jennifer Averill said being surprised would be flattering.

“I would want to be surprised with something I didn’t expect. Something bold too, like in front of people. That way, you know they really like you and want to go with you,” said Averill.

One of the main challenges for students attending prom seems to be figuring where and how to get corsages and boutonnieres.

Averill said coordinating everything has been a challenge.

“Making all the appointments for hair and makeup and picking up corsages and making sure everything matches and goes the way you want it to can be stressful,” Averill said.

The biggest difference about this year’s prom is that it is a combined junior and senior ball. Traditionally there have been separate events for the two grades. The combined event is occurring because of the high cost and relatively low turnout at prom for the past few years. By combining proms, the school hoped to get more people to attend and offset the costs. 

This plan was announced at the beginning of the year and was initially very unpopular, causing a sense of outrage among some of the seniors, who felt that senior ball should be a special event, open only to seniors and their guests.

“My first reaction when I heard the news was ‘what the heck!? This is really lame,’” said senior Aaron Yang.

However, after this initial reaction, seniors realized that many of them bring underclassmen as their guests and that having a combined prom was not that bad an idea after all.

“Now, I am cooler with the idea,” Yang said.

“I thought it wasn’t that big a deal and it would probably be a lot nicer rather than having them separate, because of money,” Averill said.

Many students have come to realize that the expense of this event is large, and that combining the two proms has allowed for a nicer venue and a better prom in general.

Prom this year will be on Saturday at the San Francisco Design Center Galleria in San Francisco California. The theme is “The City is Ours," and the event includes dinner, dessert and a cool light projection show during the dance.

Having the event in the city is something prom goers are looking forward to.

“I love that it is going to be in San Francisco. I really like the city and I think it will be very beautiful,” said Averill.