BVH MORP event gets canceled last second
On Friday April 28, Bonita Vista High teachers and staff dance John Travolta’s Grease Lightnin’ at the BVH MORP dance assembly. Accompanied by BVH’s principal Mr. Lee Romero, volunteer teachers and staff began the MORP assembly with a 1950s dance.
On Thursday April 27, the Bonita Vista High (BVH) Associated Student Body (ASB) announced the cancellation of BVH’s MORP dance during fourth period. MORP is an annual dance held by the ASB for all grade level students in BVH’s gymnasium.
According to an email sent via JupiterEd on April 20, MORP would have been held on Friday, April 28, from 7:00 p.m. to 10:00 p.m. with tickets selling for $15. Accompanying the events information, the email added on by stating “We need to sell another 100 tickets before nutrition break tomorrow or the dance will be canceled!!”.
Assistant Principal (AP) of Student Activities Patricia Perez explains that there were various reasons as to why the dance was canceled. One reason being parents’ concern for their students’ safety due to a recent school shooting threat that BVH received on April 12.
“I was receiving phone calls in my office, asking if we could guarantee the safety of students. We can’t guarantee anything. We can reassure them that we have staff and the Chula Vista Police Department coming to our events,” Perez said. “Since we had that incident, a lot of parents were feeling unsure about sending their students to school on a Friday night for a dance.”
Another reason for the MORP cancellation was due to the event coinciding with the scheduling of prom. As MORP would occur a week before prom, Perez explained that students focused on only one of the dances and therefore were preparing for prom and saving money.
“I know a lot of seniors were looking forward to prom and they were getting their dresses and scheduling what they were going to do for dinner. Their mindset was on prom. A lot of juniors were attending it, so prom was a huge event that they were hyped up and excited for, so we didn’t have a lot of students that were buying tickets for MORP,” Perez said.
Along with preparation for prom, ASB spirit commissioner and senior Blake Franklin explains that much of the student body may be preparing for the end of the 2022-23 school year. Thus, they are shifting their focus to their studies.
“Everyone is at the end of the year and sort of getting checked out to finish the school year. I feel the [low number of tickets sold] was part of that and the wrong idea on MORP [requirements],” Franklin said.
According to Franklin, only four tickets were sold. This was not enough to cover the expense of hiring a DJ. He further mentioned the general association made by the BVH student body that MORP is solely for underclassmen.
“I feel like people think that MORP is for underclassmen and that it’s going to be lame. But the dance is open to everyone,” Franklin said.
On Thursday, despite being off-campus, Perez continued to check in with the finance commissioners to see how many tickets were sold. With the tickets not offsetting the cost for the dance, the ASB decided to cancel the dance.
“I contacted the finance tech to see how many tickets we had sold. I know it was under 20 [sold]. At that point, we had to make a decision because we have the different expenses that we commit to for a dance,” Perez said. “So we look to see if we’re going to have the money to cover those expenses and so forth. We then [had to make] that decision to go ahead and cancel MORP.”
A new addition to MORP was the opportunity for students to buy tickets at the door. However, Perez explains the challenges that arise with selling tickets at the dance such as working with the choices list clearance, permission slips and finance.
“There’s different tiers and levels to getting students ready to attend a school dance and that is why we usually pre-sell tickets for any event and not sell at the event. That way, we just print our roster, we know the kids who are attending have already been cleared, checked and so forth,” Perez said.
Franklin believes that MORP is essential to uplifting the spirit on campus and takes collective planning to positively affect the BVH community. He expresses his thoughts on the delayed promotion of the MORP dance and spirit week which may have also affected the outcome of the dance.
“[The task force advisor for 2023], Mrs. Ada was working with the Task Force to start ticket sales around April 17. [Though] the ASB commission PR kind of lagged on posting the flyers,” Franklin said. “For the seventies day, they posted it that morning but we needed [to give] time to the student body to gather their outfits.”
Perez explains how during the preparation for MORP senior ASB officers were anticipating prom and expecting it to be a big hit. Though MORP was canceled and prom continued, students who purchased tickets like junior Gregory Elston, were guaranteed a $15 refund.
“[Morp] was amazing last year. I went with my friends and I loved it. So I was upset when they canceled the dance,” Elston said.
As ASB prepares to plan MORP for the 2023-24 school year, Franklin comments on how the spirit week leading up the events plays a key component. He further adds that in the future, it is essential that ASB participates in spirit weeks and begin the trends.
“We want the whole school body to be participating. It first starts with the people who are creating the spirit weeks and [ASB]. They need to dress up and [create spirit] for students,” Franklin said.
As MORP is a BVH tradition, Elston and Franklin hope that students will continue to attend the event. Furthermore, they hope to see MORP occurring next year and to continue to be part of the school’s tradition.
“It’s for everyone to get together and have fun in the gym. It’s our only dance in the gym and I’ve heard from some of my teachers and alumni even saying that that was like the dance of the year,” Franklin said. “Everyone loved that dance and it’s sad that we had to cancel it.”
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