On Saturday, October 19th, Darien High School hosted its first Homecoming Dance in years, selling over eight hundred tickets.
From 7-10pm, students from all grades came together to dance, play games, and enter a raffle for a chance to win amazing prizes.
On the surface, this event seemed to be a positive addition to the culture of the school . . . and . . . after a deep dive into the minds of the student body, it is clear that it was a success.
I asked a student from each grade to sum up the dance in one word: “Hype” (ninth grader Tucker Warnke); “Inclusive” (sophomore Ellie Byrne); “Surprising” (junior Payson England), and “Memorable” (senior Ava Gupta). What came to their minds captures the intended goals of this semi-formal. According to Community Council President, senior Yenairis Frias the “most successful aspect of the dance was the overall atmosphere. Students really connected and the raffle prizes were a BIG hit! Everyone was running around playing the games, it was amazing”, which aligns with the feedback from participants at the dance.
Soon after the event, a survey was sent out to the student body in order to obtain feedback on a larger scale, and the results are in! There has been lots of discussion about the raffle prizes, so let’s see what the studentbody has to say.
Although all prizes received votes for best prize, there is an immense gap between the top three, being the JBL Party Box, the Dyson Airwrap and the Visa Gift Card; and the rest of the prizes. From an Apple Pencil to an UberEats Gift Card, there was a raffle prize for everyone! But what prizes would our student body like to see next year? After reviewing the numerous suggestions, based off of frequency, about ten stood out the most, and here they are:
- Airpods
- Concert Tickets
- Dyson Airwrap (Again!)
- MacBook
- Sephora Gift Card
- CrumblCookie Gift Card
- Lululemon Gift Card
- Playa Bowls Gift Card
- Apple Watch
- Darien logoed apparel
On a more critical side, multiple individual interviews were carried out for feedback purposes, and one aspect of the dance was criticized by everyone: its length. Originally from 7-9 pm, the dance was extended until 10 pm due to DJ availability. However many students think this is too long with a consensus saying an end time of either 9-9:30 pm would have been more beneficial in holding the interest of the attendees for the entirety of the dance.
So you might be asking, is this semi-formal going to be making an annual return to Darien High School? Frias answered: “Yes, we are planning to have a homecoming dance next year. The positive feedback from this year’s event made it clear that students enjoyed it, so we want to keep the tradition alive.”
