The dresses were organza, sequined, sparkly, flowy and sleek. The suits were tailored, modern and sharp. The DJ went late as high heels were kicked off and the dancing continued.
Wait. College?
Yup. The seniors of the University of Maryland’s Class of 2024 defiantly held prom last Friday — a chance to celebrate what a pandemic took from them four years ago.
They were the high school seniors whose worlds were upended in the spring of 2020. Locked in their bedrooms and in front of computer screens, they lost out on so much — no prom, no real graduation ceremony, no teary, happy last day of signing yearbooks and hugging, no final game or match of their high school careers.
Heck, they didn’t even have a real freshman year when they started at U-Md. four years ago.
“I didn’t realize how important it was until tonight,” said Nadia Panni, 22, who wore a Barbie-pink, sparkly sheath dress. The ballroom was filled with balloons, music and about 500 people reveling in a senior year redux at the Stamp Student Union.
It was definitely not the scene associated with college campuses in 2024.
What these kids have been through and all they have lost is overshadowed in a weighty moment dominated by protests, arrests and — yet again — canceled ceremonies.
They are the kids whose mental health was so impacted by the upending of their lives that it was declared a national crisis, a secondary epidemic to the pandemic.
Campus unrest wasn’t even on the senior-year bingo card for the student leaders who, a little gingerly, came up with the idea to hold prom at a university.
It is, after all, a frothy teen coming-of-age ritual of awkward pictures and corsage pinnings.
These are young adults about to enter the professional world. Most of them can drink legally. What is prom without the subterfuge and endless quest to slip booze into the punch?
“We actually started becoming a bit worried because we didn’t know if people will actually want to come to prom,” said Omoleye Adeyemi, 21, president of the Student Senior Council, the group that came up with the prom idea last summer, as they began planning the activities for their final year of undergrad.
“Our class is very resilient,” Adeyemi said. “But will they want a prom?”
Adeyemi, a communications major who will enter the university’s PhD program after she graduates this year, remembered the disappointment of her senior year at Chesapeake High School in Essex, Md.
“I remember junior year, a lot of my friends actually went to junior prom and I didn’t go because I was just like, ‘Oh, there’s senior prom, so it’ll be fine,’” she said.
Early in her high school senior year, she started preparing for it. She had the prom dress custom made in Nigeria. It was bold and graphic, gray, black and orange, with a lace overlay.
“I never got to wear it,” she said.
When the student council posted the idea of prom for college seniors with a “Great Gatsby” theme, the tickets sold out immediately. Then they all got scooped up two more times as the planners kept increasing the size of the event to match the enthusiasm and demand. They finally maxed out at 900, the most they were allowed to give out (the tickets were free as long as the ticket holder was a senior) for the grand ballroom.
It was working.
Then the protests started.
Massive arrests and encampments on campuses across the nation made news. The students at U-Md. had protests, but there were no encampments and the actions weren’t disruptive to campus life.
The student leaders watched and waited. But they didn’t think the Class of 2024 deserved another cancellation.
“I think it’s good to see that our students are using their voices and Maryland provides the opportunity for all students to use their voices,” Adeyemi said. “It was a good thing that the protests happened here.”
But on Friday, the U-Md. seniors exhaled. Classes were done, the campus wasn’t in chaos, and it was finally their turn.
“It was really wonderful,” said Fiona Torok, 22, after a night of dancing in a long, purple dress that was probably bolder and more elegant than one she would’ve chosen as an 18-year-old. “I hope they make it a tradition.”
Some parents expressed interest in playing out their roles with photos and send-offs.
Most of them got shut down.
“I’ll share photos,” said Mia Hofman, 22, a graphic design major.
“It’s like the senior year we never had,” Hofman said. “Except we’re older, so it feels a little different.”
Gloria Asante, dazzling in a sparkly, tiger-print dress, didn’t think she’d care about prom.
“After everything happened with us and covid, I was just disappointed and didn’t really care about all this anymore,” said the 21-year-old, who just returned from a five-month internship in Ghana studying maternal health.
She’s an adult doing serious work about weighty issues. The world is in turmoil and she’s about to enter a challenging field.
Wouldn’t prom feel silly?
“But then, I thought, I’ve been working hard for so many years,” Asante said. “Why not celebrate?”
They celebrated, wearing masks and dancing, smiling, laughing in a crowd that had nothing to do with social distancing.
“It made me realize how sad it was,” said Panni, who left the ballroom thrilled and exhausted and remembering the pandemic prom her school held in 2020.
“My school tried a virtual prom,” she said. The students dressed up and sat in front of their Zoom screens at home. “That made me cry.”
Friday night was nothing like that sad thing.
“It was fun,” she said, “And it was, you know, finally some closure for us. A finale for this class.”
