At the beginning of the month of February, NPHS had its first ever winter semi-formal run by Ms. Berrios, the PTA, and the Neer Nation Club. Although they made it look easy, there was tons of planning that went into this event to make it a success. 

The idea for a winter dance has been going on for years, according to Berrios.

She said, “Last year, the administration had met with student and teacher focus groups to discuss what we wanted to see in the school, which was more school events and a dance.”

After the idea turned into something that could actually happen, it was presented to the Neer Nation club.

Hailey Gaeta, a member of the club,  said: “I was excited. As a freshman, I haven’t gone through high school without a dance, but people were saying it’s better that we had a dance this year.”

Neer Nation’s dance committee chose a couple of theme ideas, and then voted on them.

According to Gaeta, “some of the theme ideas were Winter Wonderland, 1920s, a Night in Paris, and Masquerade.” After tallying the votes, the winning theme was Winter Wonderland. 

Students also helped with ticket sales, hyping up the dance, and decorating. Tickets were sold during lunch for a couple of days, and could also be purchased in Ms. Berrios’s room. 

The PTA was a huge contributor to making the dance happen.

Berrios explained: “They funded the dance, so they provided the food, drinks, the DJ, decorations, and they chaperoned.”

The PTA came up with many of the ideas, specifically the decorations. Berrios and Gaeta both explained how they came to the Neer Nation club with a vision board, and got opinions from the members. 

Although the dance was a success, the main thing that Berrios would change would be promoting the dance earlier, to make students aware of it and excited for it.

However, she said “I would love to have and plan this dance again next year.”

Gaeta agrees, and said: “We should’ve just advertised it more, so that more people would’ve known about it.”

Now that students know what to expect, Berrios expects even more students to attend next year and looks forward to doing it again.