Have you noticed anything different around campus lately? Dance routines in the quad, wanted posters taped to the walls. It can only mean one thing: the imminent approach of senior ball.
Year after year, people think of more and more extravagant ways to ask their date to prom. Sometimes spanning over the course of days, in and out of class, asking a date to prom requires planning and even co-conspirators.
When senior Kyle Pringle asked senior Alyssa Parsons to ball, he sought the aid of Parsons’ family and friends. Pringle began asking her when he put Ping-Pong balls with ‘ball?’ written in locations where Parsons was going to be. He also asked Parsons’ sister for help. “It took a lot of planning and being 4 steps ahead of her. I coordinated with a lot of people,” he said.
At this point, Parsons did not know who was asking her to ball. “I was really curious. I didn’t know who was asking me, and I was trying to find out,” she said.
After three days of mysterious ping-pong balls, Pringle grafftied a giant ping pong ball on the graffiti wall in Bollinger Canyon, and had his friends bring her to graffiti wall. “I was standing on top of the wall waiting for her,” he said.
Parsons said, “I was really happy when I found out who it was because we’re really good friends. I was confused because he said he was asking someone else.”
According to Parsons, it was an exciting experience. “It’s better than being asked a boring way,” she said. Despite the coordination and work it took, Pringle had fun asking Parsons. “It was really stressful, but worth it,” he said.
Even though the ping pong balls were delivered during class, Parsons added that it didn’t disturb the class. “It was fun because our whole class was trying to figure out who it was,” she said.
Guys aren’t the only ones who can ask a date to ball anymore though. Senior Paige Dobon asked her boyfriend of 3 years, Jack Evans, to ball on the quad. Dobon and her friends from the California Academy of Performing Arts (CAPA) performed a dance number using basketballs and uniforms.
“Jack is a very simple man, so I knew if he asked me to ball it would be nice, but small, so I just decided to throw a big dance number at Campo,” Dobon said. According to Dobon, the 20 girls spent an hour choreographing and another hour rehearsing. “Everyone was so willing, and we’re all dancers,” she said.
Dobon also put up flyers around school advertising a “big event in the quad at lunch.”
“We really wanted to embarrass Jack, so we wanted as many people as possible to come,” she said.
Dobon wanted the event to be spectacular. “It was a fun thing to do for senior year and we all just wanted to do something really big to be remembered for. We all had a really good time doing it, and he liked it,” she said. Dobon also felt that more girls should ask their dates to ball, instead of the other way around.
“More girls should ask guys in extravagant ways because girls are better,” she said.
Senior Sydney Liu also planned a song and dance number to ask senior Annie Guo to ball. “I hurt my ankle, which made it really hard to walk, but I pushed through it.”
Senior Laura Gustafson said, “They’re really entertaining to watch.”
Senior Ball traditionally follows Junior Prom, which can also involve grand, public gestures. Junior Tyler Moore asked Lauren Petite to prom by moving her car into the quad before lunch. “I wrote on it, and when she walked in, I had markers for her so she could check ‘yes’ or ‘no.’” After Petite said yes, they walked across the quad to cheers. “There were a lot of people, so we were nervous,” Moore said.
Moore had help from senior Ryan Gannett. “It was a group effort,” Moore added.
