On April 30th 2016 juniors from Terra Linda High School attended the Terra Linda Junior Prom. It was at Stone Tree, which is a Bay Club owned property. I had high expectations for the dance and they were met. However, I did disagree with some of the rules we had to follow.

I was not too happy about how we had to take that bus. When we first arrived at school on that warm April evening there were three school-sponsored buses waiting for us. I understand that there are liabilities and they wanted to get every student there in one piece. One problem was how they did not want students driving since they didn’t have their year. Well, let’s think about that for a second. Students need to get to TL to get on the bus, so they’re going to drive anyway. They also need to drive back, so doesn’t that defeat the purpose? It might have been a good idea to get extra buses so that all students could get to prom at the same time. As it was, students who didn’t get on the first three buses had to wait about thirty minutes for the first bus to come back.

There were rumors going around before the dance about you could walk the golf course. That was a lie, and students were disappointed because that would have been something to do if someone didn’t want to dance. I don’t understand why they closed outside patio area. On the patio area there was bean bag toss, foosball, pool, and sitting areas. But people seemed content sitting inside. I do understand the liability and how difficult it is to watch two hundred students with only so many volunteers and security guards.

The venue itself was very beautiful. Everything looked new, especially the dance hall, with the elegant display of decorations. Decorations were dangling from the top of the ceiling making it feel like you were in the Great Gatsby.  One: TL did a beautiful theme setup. The Bay Club did a decent job with the food options. On one table there were pizza sticks and snacks and then there was the chocolate fountain, which was a popular choice for many of the attendees.

The music at the dance was great, and there was a huge variety of music. Music was played from the 90s all the way up to 2016. A big hit was when one of the last songs they played was September by Earth Wind and Fire. Students who were lingering around and sitting down enjoying themselves got up just to dance to this song. The best part of the dance was how students could request songs via Jack Connolly’s app called UpBeat. You could request a song from Soundcloud and Spotify and it would then be voted for by the attendees. Most of the songs played were songs from the Billboard hot one hundred. When you were tired of dancing you could play chess  or take pictures at the photo booth. Many students found it more enjoyable to kick back.

Although many juniors from Terra Linda attended, there was a vast majority of seniors that went and also many students from Marin Catholic. Brendan Campagna, a junior from MC, said “I enjoyed myself and would give it a 10/10.” The consensus from most of the student body was that it was a good dance and I would have to agree.