Homecoming was once the pride and joy of Deerfield High School when it rolled around each year, like it still is for virtually every other high school in the area. However, in recent years, DHS’ homecoming dance attendance has declined, leaving the entire process, from homecoming week to the homecoming football game with much less pizazz than before. In response to the decline, the school has made a multitude of changes to the dance in an attempt to reverse the trend, but students are not budging. It is important to realize that it is on the students to respond to the changes sooner rather than later, so homecoming regains popularity.

Attendance drops as students age, with interest waning from year to year. About 80% of 64 seniors informed me via on a Google Form that they attended freshman year, a number that drops precipitously: 58% attended the following year, followed by 22%. Only 23% plan to attend this year. Students have generally found the dance to be boring, juvenile and without a purpose or real reason to stay very long, if at all.

This year’s attempts to change include the the first all-school pep rally, the addition of a live student band along with the standard Bizar Entertainment, as well as a raffle prize that can only be claimed if the winner is present at the end of the night to receive it, an attempt to incentivize students to stay the entirety of the dance. Here’s the issue with the changes: the school in general, but seniors in particular, aren’t responding to them, and they’re the ones who influence all of the younger students, informing their decisions for future years.

Of the 34 seniors I surveyed in a different Google Form, 94.1% of them liked or were indifferent to the changes. But, more importantly, 34 out of 34 said that their decision to go to the dance was not influenced at all by the changes. So, sure, the changes are good, but nobody’s changing their mind because of them, and that’s what’s truly important. It’s nice to know that the students like the changes, but that ultimately doesn’t matter.

Last year, I was a member of former Principal Dignam’s first Principal’s Advisory Committee, made up of about four dozen students ranging all four grade levels. Of course, one of the most discussed topics was making homecoming an event students want to go to, with many expensive and ambitious improvements (such as a parade or a king and queen) bandied about. But, if students don’t show that they want to go to the dance at all, the administration has no incentive to put more money into this event. Thus, the blame falls on the students for their for refusal to compromise or accept what we have for the time being. Our school is suffering from a severe shortage of spirit—a lack of pride in being a warrior.

Again, to get what we want, we have to show that we can compromise with what’s already given to us. The administration won’t put in the funding to make the dance better if nobody proves that they want to go to the dance at all. Don’t just go to the dance because it’s what the school wants you to do—if you think of it in the selfish terms of ultimately getting what you want, then fine, whatever gets you to go. The dance is why Student Council spends so much time decorating the hallways, and even if you don’t go to the dance itself, it’s the reason why we’re all occupied with dinners and parties that evening.

Increased attendance to the dance itself will unite all of us as a community, and will set a precedent for more and more seniors going every year, and will make the dance itself more fun and interesting. We’ll see tomorrow if the all-school, mandated pep rally embeds this spirit within us, but we still must take it upon ourselves to go to the dance. It’s going to be gradual, but if this change starts now—with this year’s seniors starting the trend, then the benefits we want to see will follow. It’s going to take a while, but we can, and we will make homecoming great again.