OR ARE YOU A PARENT HELPING TO PLAN A YEAR 6 END OF YEAR PARTY?

Love Productions, home of The Great British Bake-Off, is producing a pilot TV show about Year 6 proms.

We are looking for children and parents gearing up for the big day.

If you would like to find out more, we’d love to hear from you.

For a chat, please get in touch:

Charlotte Armstrong:  020 7067 4873

Charlotte.armstrong@loveproductions.co.uk

One of the earliest decisions the prom committee needs to make is whether there will be a prom king and queen. Here is some information on how it's done in America (after all, that's where this whole prom thing has come from in the first place) and some thoughts about whether it fits for a UK school prom.

American prom kings and queens

Being the king and queen of a prom is a Big Deal in America. You can tell by the number of films and TV shows that feature it. I'm old enough to remember a whole episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer that revolved around the contest to become prom queen for example.

In many schools, electing a prom king and queen is nothing more than a popularity contest. The candidates need to be nominated and seconded, and then weeks of crazing campaigning involving posters all over the school and bribes and secret deals are carried out frantically right up until the vote, with the winners announced at the prom itself.

Nowadays however, many American schools are only letting students who have achieved a certain level of academic grades, or those who participate in extra-curricula activities be nominated. I suppose they're trying to encourage better performance at school and also improve the image of academic success. I quite like the idea of linking that prime moment in the spotlight with more than just a popularity contest.

Does the whole prom king and queen thing work in the UK?

Well, yes, if you want it to! Some schools don't like students to be too distracted by their campaigns and so don't allow the whole popularity contest aspect of voting for a prom king and queen. If that's the case in your school, you could do it differently…

Choosing the prom royalty on the night

You could ask a group of teachers, or a secretly allocated group of guests (who would be excluded from winning) to agree on a prom king and queen on the night itself, perhaps based upon their outfits and how well they're dancing.

If that seems like too much of a minefield, then simply arrange for a ballot on the night, just like the general election. You could give voting slips with each ticket, so people can only make one vote each.

Adopting the high flyer approach

You could always set criteria for nominees like being in a school club, getting certain grades or having been positively involved in school life in some other way. It depends on your school; that might cause an uproar in some and for others it might be a way to improve how much people participate and how well they do in that prom year.

I don't think that being prom king and queen has taken off in the UK as much as it has in the States, but who knows what will happen as it grows in popularity. And who wouldn't like to have a fuss made over them?

Are you having a prom king and queen? How are you going to decide who it should be? Let us know in the comments!

I had an email from a lovely lass who has stumbled into being the treasurer on her prom committee, and, unsurprisingly, is feeling a bit overwhelmed. Here is her note (name withheld to protect identity) and my response is below, so the rest of you stressed prom committee treasurers can benefit too.

Dear Em,

I have to look after the money for our prom (no-one else wanted to do it) and I'm freaking out! Don't know where to start, help!

T

The skinny on keeping track of the prom money

Dear T,

Firstly, don't panic

The most important thing about your job on the prom committee is making sure that there is enough money to pay for the prom service providers (e.g. caterers, entertainers, balloon people etc) at the right time.

In order to do this, you need to keep really careful records, and that's where having a book dedicated to the prom accounts is critical (as is the other admin stuff I talked about here). Once you've got your accounting book, here is a list of the things you need to keep track of every week. At the beginning, the records are really simple:

1. Money that has come into the account
e.g. funds from the latest prom fundraising event (There's a whole section on fundraising ideas in your Prom Organiser e-book)

2. Money that has been paid out of the account
e.g. £20.50 – poster printing

You also need to keep hold of the receipts for anything that has been paid, so a box file is a good thing to have too.

Of course, as it gets closer to the prom, you'll also have to keep track of ticket sales and payments to make sure that enough money is coming in.

Once the prom committee knows what kind of prom they want to have, then suppliers will be contacted for quotes. Ask the people gathering these quotes to give a paper copy to you, so they are kept in one place.

A good while before the prom, the committee needs to decide who they are going to use, and that's when those quotes become critical. For example, if you're having a casino, they will have sent a quote detailing:

•    The price for their services
•    How much needs to be paid as a deposit
•    When that deposit needs to be paid by
•    When the balance of payment needs to be paid.

Whoa! What exactly is a deposit and balance of payment?

A deposit is a small proportion of the final bill paid in advance to secure that company for your event. If they cost £500 for the night, they may ask for £100 before the event to confirm the booking.

Remember: Most deposits are non-refundable!

If the committee change their mind after the deposit has been paid, then they've lost that money – the business takes that for the inconvenience of having turned away other customers for that same night.

As for the balance of payment, that's the rest of the final fee, so in this example, it would be £400.

Timings are different from company to company

Some prom companies want deposits at least a month before the event, with final payment on the night. Other companies prefer to take a deposit and then send you an invoice after the prom (a bill detailing the money you need to pay them) which then has to be paid within a certain window, such as 7 days, or a month.

That's why it's really important to write these details down in a special place as soon as the supplier has been chosen.

Why? Because when the prom is over, all accounts will need to be paid. So if you have made that list, you can look up who needs to be paid what and when. Sorted!

Where the prom money can get complicated

Let's say a month before the event you need to pay out over £500 in deposits to different people, but ticket sales aren't picking up yet and you've only got £100 in the account.

Uh-oh.

This is why it's really important to decide upon prom suppliers early and make a note of how much is needed for a deposit and when. If you've done that, then two months before you need to pay them, you can say at the prom committee meeting "Look guys, we need to find £500 in two months, so start selling some tickets already, and by the way, when is the next fundraising event? Capiche?"

Then you still have time to get the money in, and pay them so the prom can actually happen. In doing that, you've saved the prom from financial disaster. That sounds really heroic (and it is!) but don't be surprised if no-one notices that.

Tips for good prom book-keeping

•    Whenever you pay a deposit, make sure you get a receipt
•    Whenever you receive an invoice, make sure you file it after making a note of when it needs to be paid (even better, just pay it straight away)
•    Always get a receipt for the payment of the final invoice.
•    Write it all down in your accounts book!

So there you go, the basics of prom book-keeping. It's a thankless task, but arguably the most important, and blimey, it looks really good on your university / job applications…

If you have any prom treasurer related questions, pop them into the comments and I'll do my best to help!

P.S. Why all the receipts? Well, sometimes people in companies make mistakes, sometimes banks do, and sometimes you do. A paper trail of receipts makes it really easy to wave something solid in the air and prove that you really have paid. It's also important for the school because you may well have left by the time any queries arrive, so you need to leave behind all the evidence of your treasurer genius. Good luck!

In other words, all of the fun bits and none of the stress…

Things can get sticky later on however. When all of the big decisions are made, like prom theme, ticket price, date etc, the details have to be taken care of. Once the details have been decided upon, someone actually has to go and make it happen. Someone has to phone a prom service supplier and get a quote. Someone has to make sure the bank account is opened and the funds there and accessible. Someone has to collate quotes, then confirm bookings, pay deposits, keep receipts, check the balance is paid and oh! Suddenly that's not looking so fun any more, is it?

Ways to stop the stress creeping into prom organising

If you implement these tips early on, not only will the later stages of prom planning be a lot less stressful, next year's prom committee will have an easier time of it too.

1. Keep a prom committee minutes book

Nominate a person who will take notes (usually called minutes) during every committee meeting, and summarises the decisions made during that meeting. When there are twenty people in a room shouting out their opinions all at once, it's easy to lose track of what has actually been settled upon.

It might help to write key decisions on the whiteboard so that everyone can see them as they are made – and don't get a horrible surprise later on because they missed something.

2. Keep an actions and to-do list produced from each meeting

A key decision invariably leads to an action, which produces a to-do list for key people. For example, if you decide that you want to have a magician perform for guests during the prom, that means someone has to find one (the action) and the to-do list would be to find entertainers that perform at large scale events like proms, weddings and balls and contact them for quotes.

If the person nominated to do that sees it written down in the book, they're more likely to remember to do it.

3. Start every meeting with a review of minutes and actions update

Taking a minute to read the big decisions from the last meeting and asking each person with tasks how they're getting on does two important things: it gets everyone's brain back into the business of organising a prom and it also signals to people who have important tasks that they should be making progress. If they have forgotten and then have to say that in front of everyone, they're a lot less likely to forget again.

Sound harsh? Well, it might be, but believe me, you don't want to find out a week before the prom that someone forgot to confirm a booking, or that the tickets haven't been printed because someone got distracted.

4. Get a box file for all paperwork relating to suppliers

When you start to get formal quotes, contracts, deposit receipts etc from your suppliers the paperwork really adds up and every single piece of it is important. Buy a box file NOW and use it to keep all of it in the same place. Bring it to every meeting so that people can place whatever they've obtained into the central file. It could save you a lot of time and stress later on.

5. Get a big box to put it all in and a place to store it (preferably the library)

With a minutes book, an accounts book (we'll talk about that another time) and the suppliers paperwork, along with poster proofs, tickets and all kinds of stuff that you don’t want to loose, getting one of those big plastic tubs with a lid is a great idea.

Keeping it in the library is best because classrooms rarely have space and you might have meetings in different rooms. Libraries are used to keeping important things, and it means that everyone knows where to look year after year. The teacher who is helping you this year may not be at the school for subsequent prom committees, so if they have all of the stuff you figured out in a box that they can get right at the start, think about how much easier they'll find prom organising.

Think about how nice it would have been to go and get that box, turn to a new page in the minutes book and make your mark for all of your school's future prom committees to find.

Prom committee paperwork… it's not glam, it's not sexy, but if you get it right, it can make everything so much easier.

P.S. I know everything is being done on computer these days, but the core items I describe here are best in dedicated paper notebooks because computer systems change, people will lose or delete files kept on their own computers and memory sticks when they leave school and who knows what people will be using in five years time anyway? A box of books and files is easier to hand down year after year.

If you're looking forward to your school prom, you're in the right place!

In case you're new around here, let me tell you about some of the things we talked about last academic year and what we have lined up for this year.

And I'll also tell you about our juicy monthly prize draw on Facebook.

Before that though, don't forget to download your FREE prom organiser e-book by clicking on the link at the top, or the button over there on the right or just by clicking here. You go ahead, I can wait.

So, what can you read right here, right now to get you up to speed on all things prom-tacular?

Posts for prom committee peeps

From whether you're the right kind of person to be on a prom committee to the nuts and bolts of what the people on a prom committee actually do, this is the section you need to read if you want to be right in the thick of organising your school prom.

See all the prom committee posts

Fundraising and finance for proms

Not the most fun or glamorous part I know, but still important. Find posts on prom budgets, cashflow and how to manage it all in the prom finance section.

Organising the prom

Once you've got the committee and money plans all sorted, it's time to think about your prom theme, key people like your prom photographer and how to entertain your prom guests.

Enjoying your school prom

Let's face it, there are some bits that you might be worried about, such as the whole getting a prom date thing. Well, we've already given ten romantic ways to ask someone to be your prom date, wondered whether you even need a prom date anyway and given some tips on how NOT to get a prom date. No doubt there will be more to come…

See all of the "Enjoying your prom" posts.

Looking fab for your prom

And how could we have a prom blog without advice on how to look your most gorgeous on the night?

One of our most popular posts is about choosing the best prom dress design for your body shape, and there is also one about rather fabulous corsage bracelets too.

That leads me rather neatly onto what's coming soon: the first will be a post about which colour suits you best, and I'll be doing a series on different prom themes to help you with some ideas.

Is there anything you want to know about? If you have a prom related question, simply drop me a line and let me know.

Facebook

We hang out on Facebook too, come and join us and you'll automatically be entered into a monthly prize draw for iTunes vouchers (or vouchers for something else if you don't have an iPod). Find us on Facebook here and click on "like" at the top – we'd love to get to know you.

And don't forget your e-book!

Happy new school year!

Em x

The Prom Organiser wordsmith

It's also time to decide if you want to be on the prom committee. Over the next couple of weeks, school assemblies up and down the country will be announcing calls for prom committee volunteers, and you might be tempted.

What's the big deal? Prom planning is easy, right?

Planning a prom is hard work. Trust me. It really is; I've met prom committee members who are simply exhausted by the end of it all. They're often thrilled with the results, but exhausted nonetheless. I've sat in on chaotic prom committee meetings with arguments flying back and forth, and people throwing their hands up in the air, ready to quit then and there.

This isn't something that you should walk into blindly.

Yes, it's a lot of fun too. And prom committee members have the chance to really shape something big – to put their stamp on a school prom that will be photographed and set forever in a school's history. But committee members do put a lot of time and effort into it.

Do you have what it takes to be on the prom committee?

There are three main qualities that every person who wants to be on a prom committee should have – everything else (like great poster design skills for example) is a bonus.

Do you have the time?

Lots of people who volunteer for prom committees, also tend to volunteer for other things too. They're nice like that. Look at your schedule carefully. What other clubs, societies and crazy schemes are you involved in? Have you accounted for the increased workload of an exam year? Do you really have the time to devote to prom planning?

Are you reliable?

When you say you'll do something, do you? There's no place for people who can't follow-up on tasks that they have responsibility for on the prom committee. Even if you are fabulous in every other way, if you don't deliver the goods when it counts, it's no use to anyone.

Can you maintain a long-term commitment?

I'm not talking about marriage here, but planning a prom takes months and months of meetings, work between meetings and loads of decisions. Do you lose interest in things easily? If so, you might just want to think twice before committing.

At the end of the day it's up to you. Feel free to ignore everything I've said here. I don't want to put people off at all – being a prom committee member is hugely exciting and satisfying – and a great thing to put on university and job applications.

Just remember that there is a hint in the word ‘committee' – it takes commitment, can you handle that?

Advertise here

 Once you have a smaller group of committed volunteers, there are three critical decisions you need to make:

1. Do you have a formal prom committee with defined roles?
2. What is the date of the prom?
3. What is the prom theme?

The formal committee decision

 There are pros and cons to this approach, so a discussion about it might be a good idea.

Formal prom committee pros:

• Everyone knows who is responsible for what
• No tasks get left out or forgotten, because there will be a nominated person (or people) responsible for them
• People can concentrate on things they like doing and not have to worry about the other stuff
• People can get credit for more specific things

Formal prom committee cons:

• People might take on a role and find out they hate it
• Not all committee roles are glamorous – how do you handle filling the role no-one wants?
• Do people want to be stuck in one role for the next six months?
• What happens if someone needs to drop out because of unforeseen circumstances?
• What if someone thinks they can do the job but can’t handle it?
• Some roles are harder than others, or have more responsibility

Ultimately this decision is all about finding the balance between being efficient and organised, but not so regimented that all the fun is taken out of it. One approach could be that everyone discusses ideas, tasks etc, but the responsibility for making the decisions actually happen falls on a specialised prom committee member. For example, you can all discuss the decorations together and decide what you want, but then it’s up to the committee member responsible for décor to actually go and source materials, get quotes and buy the gear, and arrange for it to be put up on the day.

Setting the date of the prom

Your school might have already decided upon the date – so there’s one less thing for you to worry about! If it hasn’t been decided already, then there are few things you need to bear in mind.

Firstly, the prom is likely to be at the end of the year, so find out the date of the last exam so everyone can be chilled out on the night. If any key prom committee members are in the last exam, you might want to set it a couple of days later so they can get their head around prom stuff again (especially if they’re the ones decorating the venue!).

Secondly, you need to make sure that the date doesn’t clash with any other major events in your area. Some events (like festivals) are held at the same time every year, so they’ll be easy to find out about. To be absolutely certain, pop into (or call) the local tourist information office as they will have a long term schedule. (It’s best to visit as they may not have an up-to-date website.)

Thirdly, spare a thought for the Mums and Dads that might be the taxi for the night and choose a day that is at the end of the week (Thursday or Friday is ideal – Saturdays might clash with weddings and other family events).

Deciding upon a prom theme

Having a theme for a prom gives you the opportunity to have lots of fun with decorations and entertainment, and can help guests choose what to wear. It makes planning a prom easier too as it narrows down all the options, and it makes a more memorable night.

It’s critical to decide upon the theme at the first proper meeting, as it will shape all of the planning and budgeting for the entire prom. You might come to an agreement quickly, or you might have a few favourites you can’t choose between. You could always hold a ballot, either within the committee or for the whole school year. Or it could be a matter of choosing the theme that is the cheapest and easiest to arrange.

Don’t forget that the prom theme can simply be colours, rather than something more complex. Black and white balls are very popular, for example, and a black and white prom could look really stylish with minimal effort.

Most schools make an announcement in assembly calling for volunteers to be on the prom committee. Great; there’s loads of excitement and lots of interest. Then the first meeting happens, and tonnes of people turn up with loads of ideas and it turns into a mosh pit.

There’s a real difference between the people who will turn up at the first prom volunteers meeting and the people who will be at the last prom committee meeting: commitment. Not everyone at the volunteers meeting will understand how much work is involved, or that it’s not all fun ideas and putting up balloons. The thing is, you won’t know who the really great committee members are at this point. So how do you deal with a room of excited people all wanting to contribute?

Brainstorm!

Turn the situation to your advantage by getting everyone to calm down and then ask for two volunteers to be scribes. One needs to be happy to stand at the whiteboard and write stuff on it, the other has to be happy to write / type fast.

Then someone else has to be temporary chairman. This could be the head boy or girl or a teacher – someone who is used to fielding lots of shouting people!

The chairperson then asks everyone to give ideas about what they would want to see at the prom – don’t worry if they’re outlandish, or crazy – what’s important at this point is creativity and ideas – they can be pruned later.

The scribe at the board writes the ideas as bullet points. The second scribe copies these onto paper and also writes down things that might not be making it on to the board, such as other ideas they hear from the group (let’s face it, people are going to be talking over one another).

When all of the wishes are exhausted, the second scribe makes sure that all the bullet points on the board are down on the page and the board is cleared. The Chairperson calls for a bit of order and asks for ideas about what people definitely don’t want at the prom. The scribes do the same as they did before.

A word of warning

Don’t make any promises. Make it clear that this is just brainstorming and that ideas are being put on the table that may not be feasible when investigated further.

Finding the really committed people for the prom committee

The ideas that come out of this meeting will begin to shape the school prom, but at this point, they are only ideas. The next step is research, and this is where you can start to whittle out the people who aren’t committed.

The chairperson needs to ask for volunteers to take away something from the list to investigate. Make it clear that if a person volunteers, they need to come back in a week’s time with a list of three local companies that can provide that service and an example picture if they can find one on the web. If you really want to get down to business, tell the volunteers that if they can’t do their bit now, they won’t be on the committee.

At this point, some people will drop out. Some will take a task away, but not turn up with the goods at the next meeting – and not be on the committee as a result. It might seem harsh, but organising a prom is hard work and needs a team of people who are reliable and committed. Finding out who those people are sooner rather than later will take away a lot of stress down the line. Of course, if you prefer, you can let the process happen naturally.

So what’s the point of a prom budget?

Fundamentally, everything that has to be bought or hired for the prom will have to be paid for – and to pay for it you need to find money, some of it ahead of prom night, some of it afterwards. If you don’t set a budget, you have no idea how much money you have to raise, and also how much money you can realistically spend.

Setting the prom budget involves a combination of maths and guesswork. But don’t panic, here’s the low-down.

Firstly you need the following numbers:

• How many people you think will buy prom tickets.
• How much money each ticket will be sold for.

Then you need to multiply them with each other, e.g.

150 tickets sold at £15 each = £2250

That’s how much money you are likely to make on ticket sales BUT it is only an estimate, probably based on the number of people in your year. However, it’s a good starting point for your prom budget.

So that’s the maths bit (and a bit of guesswork too.) Now for the fun part.

The wish list!

Make a list of all the things you as a committee think the prom should have. Go crazy: chocolate fountains, red carpets, dance floor, the best DJ in the county, whatever. Then do a bit of research online and find out how much each one might cost. Add it all up.

This is the point when you realise that a) you can’t have everything on your wish list and b) ticket sales alone won’t cover the prom.

So the next stage is to prune the list: what are the most important things to have? What can the committee stand to lose from the list? When you’ve got the pruned list, you need to start getting real quotes from local companies.

The next important bit of maths comes from the following calculations:

• The total cost of the items on the “must have” list (let’s say for an example this is £5,600)
• The revenue from ticket sales (in our example this was £2250)

All you do is subtract the cost of the must-haves from the ticket revenue:

2250 – 5,600 = – £3350

Uh-oh. There’s a minus – that’s the amount of money you need to raise to be able to have everything on your must-have list.

Simple huh?

Well… actually, that’s only part of it. This is where the ugly brother of budgeting comes in: cash flow.