The Homecoming Dance at Hollis Brookline High School has never been much of a hit. In years past, it’s been overshadowed by sports, clubs, and other events like Old Homes Day. This year’s Homecoming Dance was set to be hosted on Saturday, Sept. 29. However, the Homecoming Dance has been cancelled, as announced by the senior student council and the senior class advisors.

The primary cause that resulted in the cancellation of the dance is funding. The budget entails that school functions hosted on Saturdays need to be limited, as the school cannot afford to pay the janitorial staff for the extra hours. As the dance was set to be hosted on a Saturday, it fell outside of the budgeting capabilities, and the dance was cancelled.

In an attempt to maintain the dance’s status, student council proposed changing the date to Friday, Sept. 28, but with a volleyball game interfering, the proposal was declined.

“[Student Council] had been trying to revamp the dance, and had been talking about trying something new with Homecoming even before the conflict arose,” said Lauren Grosse, senior class advisor and English teacher.

In addition to the lack of funding, student council has found that the Homecoming dance has not been much of a hit amongst students. The attendees tend to show up, stay for a bit, and leave after an hour or so. To make the dance more engaging, the Senior Student Council has opted to reschedule, retitle, and revamp the cancelled dance.  

“In past years, people always came due to obligations for their sports teams… [the students] end up not liking the dance. To attract more attention, [student council] made  [the dance] more of a classic semi-formal,” said Dhruv Miglani ‘19, Senior Class President.

The new dance is projected to be called the Harvest Dance, and will be hosted on Friday, Nov. 2. Students who were looking forward to the cancelled dance are excited with this announcement.

“Homecoming is cool, you go with your friends, there’s a lot to be excited about,” said Addison Whitehead ‘22

Hopefully the retitled and rescheduled dance will be a success for both Student Council and a hit for years to come.