As the end of the year draws closer, Student Council is focusing on prom and the Color Run, as well as an all-school video, as their main projects for the time being.
With the two events just a month away, Student Council has decided to push these projects to the forefront. With the “Come Sail Away” theme of the LHS Prom, a lot of time and money has gone into making the event special. Prom will take place on the Spirit of Chicago, a 600-person cruise ship, according to spiritcruises.com, that sails from Navy Pier. This doesn’t come cheap, as it also includes an open buffet, as opposed to previous years, in which there was one meal option. In order to help compensate for the lavish prom experience, Student Council has done a couple of things, including slightly raising prom tickets by $5. According to senior and Executive Board member Shannon Roche, the tickets “should’ve gone up closer [to] $15 to actually compensate.”
In order to help subsidize the costs, Student Council is opening the Prom Boutique. The boutique is an online shop in which students can get prom memorabilia and gear, instead of getting little tokens throughout the night. For example, last year students received a poker chip and a deck of cards with the prom logo, but this year, students can buy anything from t-shirts to drawstring bags to water bottles.
More items tie in with the theme. These include tank tops, beach towels, and even sandals. In keeping with the tradition of males getting their female dates a picture frame, a 5 x 7 picture frame with an engraved prom logo can be purchased on the site for only $10. Unfortunately for females, they cannot buy their dates the traditional flask from the online boutique. According to senior Shannon Miller, the site is great idea that should make money, even if girls can’t buy the flasks.
“The site is really easy to use and the stuff on there isn’t expensive at all. I understand why they wouldn’t sell the flasks but it’s sort of unfair that the boys have an easy place to get the frames. The rest of the stuff on the site is really cool though,” reasoned Miller.
The site can be reached by going to the LHS homepage and clicking the link found under the “School News” area.
“The hope is that instead of getting the little favors that people usually get and don’t use or they get rid of, that this year they can go online and buy something nice that they’ll want to keep and use again,” explained Roche. “The stuff we’re selling is more high quality than the stuff students got in previous years.”
While prom has consumed a lot of the time that Student Council has, they have still put a lot of effort into the color run. The LHS Color Run will be on Saturday, May 9, starting at noon. The cost is $30 for ages 13 and up, and it takes runners on a 2.6-mile course beginning at LHS and wrapping around Butler Lake. The run will be hosted by 102.3 XLC, a radio station headquartered in Lake County. While all of this is expensive to cover, there hasn’t been too much in terms of fundraising, much to the thanks of local businesses. According to junior and Executive Board President Cam Chen, there has been a lot of money coming in from donations.
“The community has been so helpful to us. Jet’s Pizza has donated pizza to us; Mickey Finn’s gave us a ton of gift cards and money. The whole goal of this is to help the foundation of Safe Water – Kenya, and the donations have allowed us to focus more on the event than the fundraising, which is great,” said Chen.
The objective of these events is to make them memorable, with a lasting impact. Besides prom and the Color Run, there is another project that Student Council is working on that they hope will have a lasting effect for years to come. Senior and Executive Board member Joey Pucino is heading the project of organizing a school-wide video.
The video, which will be shown at an all-school assembly at the end of May, as well as at future freshmen orientations, looks to “increase school spirit, showcase the campus, and promote clubs, sports, and academics,” according to Pucino. The basic premise of the video is to go throughout the school and campus with a camera as different groups are set up showcasing their faction. The video was inspired by other schools who have made these “lip-dub” videos, in which the camera travels accompanied by students lip-syncing and dancing. The students will dance and sing and lead the camera to the next location, where it will focus on the next specific group or set of people. The music hasn’t yet been selected but according to Pucino, “no matter what song [Student Council] choose[s] it’ll be upbeat and fun.”
“We will have a track through the school, and people will have signs and be supporting their groups, grades, sports, etc. It will be filmed on a Tuesday during an assembly schedule,” stated Pucino. The Tuesday of filming will be May 19, the day after senior ditch day.
For more information on both prom and the LHS Color Run, visit lhsdoi.com.
