April is the month when students start to talk about something different than what they have been talking about all year. These conversations usually start with something on the lines of: “When will he ask me?” “Will anyone ask me?” “Did you buy your dress yet?” That talk is about prom, and junior prom is May 18 this year, and senior prom is June 1.
Since these dances are specifically organized for a certain grade, the majority of the people at that dance will be from that grade. An underclassman might not feel comfortable being surrounded by older students.
Junior Nicolette Fardon said, “I’m perfectly fine with going to another grade’s prom because I know a lot of seniors. I’m kind of nervous, but extremely excited.”
Some are not inhibited at all by the fact they are going to a dance for older students. Junior Nicola Wiseman said, “It’s better personally. It gives me time to get to know the seniors. Plus, most of my friends are seniors.”
In high school, students are much less withdrawn when they are with older students than in middle school, and very often, students find that most of their friends are from a different grade.
Junior Genevieve Nuttall agreed with Wiseman, “I have most of my classes with seniors, so I made a lot of friends with seniors this year. I feel more comfortable going to senior prom since I have a date.”
While there are quite a few juniors going to senior prom, it is much less common for a sophomore to go to either junior or senior prom. Sophomore Jackie Pinkham feels slightly different about going to prom with upperclassmen.
Pinkham said, “I am a little nervous because it’s with a different grade, especially the seniors, but I’m really more excited than nervous because I know a lot of seniors who are going to be there.” As long as there are friends along with them, it does not matter whether it is a different grade or not.
While the student from the different grade may feel slightly uneasy about being the odd one out, the majority of the others at the dance do not have much of a problem with it. As Pinkham put it, “From what I’ve heard, a lot of the upperclassmen don’t mind having underclassmen there.”
By the end of the school year, all students are celebrating the fact that summer is coming up, so they mostly do not mind having younger students at their dance.