Dear Kirkwood, 

Picture this: You’ve just gotten home from a Halloween party. You change out of your trendy Spirit Halloween costume and take off the layers of makeup that transformed you into a monster for the night. You can feel your teeth ache from the candy you snacked on from morning to night. At the end of this creepy and fun-filled day, you finally get in bed and close out the spooky season by watching your favorite Halloween movie. But what happens when the homecoming dance, AKA the Friendship Dance, is the following day? This is the question of the season, sending shivers down petrified Pioneers’ spines. This year, students have to figure out how to manage Halloween and homecoming on the same weekend. Will there be any survivors?

At most high schools, the week leading up to the first home football game of the season consists of exciting homecoming festivities. Then, the Saturday after the game, the homecoming dance is held. Why not at KHS? Our first home game was in September, but our homecoming dance isn’t until November. Also, “homecoming” means exactly what it says: that students are coming back “home” to school. So why are we celebrating our return-to-learning dance almost a full semester into the year? Not to mention the terrifying temperature difference between September and November that digs early graves for Pioneers. With this school dance’s unofficial dress code requiring short, sometimes bodycon dresses, our female population is left chilled to the bone. It seems like in the first week of November, frostbite rates rise about 300% from dance cases alone. However, if homecoming was moved to September, KHS would have warm and happy students who could experience the superior tradition of an early homecoming dance.

Though we wish we had an early homecoming, the reality is our back-to-school dance is only a day away from All Hallows Eve. Of course, homecoming and Halloween are both top tier autumn events, but having them back-to-back on a Friday and Saturday is something only Satan could conjure up. Getting ready for hours, figuring out carpools and staying out late are things that should have a few-day buffer in between. Well, guess what? This year, you’ll be dressing up as something bloodcurdling one night and then strutting in your finest formal attire the next. So I advise you to restock on your strongest makeup remover and make sure you don’t overdose on candy this Halloween night, because the second most important dance of your high school career is the next day. Good luck!

So, KHS, have I made my point clear? Our homecoming is months too late in the school year. The freezing limbs, broken traditions and the disrespect of homecoming’s name does not make our school any better or cooler. Sometimes fitting in can be beneficial, and in this case, having an early dance like every other high school would solve all of our issues. If you want everyone alive, well and back at school on the Monday following Hallo/hoco-weekend, then move the date before it’s too late, because who knows if there will be any survivors. 

Sincerely, 

A spooked Pioneer