BYFIELD – With prom season right around the corner, Triton Regional High School’s National Honor Society is working to ensure that attendees, regardless of how much money they have, can get dressed to the nines during its annual prom dress drive.
The concept for the drive came about last year after Triton English teacher and National Honor Society advisor Erin Dempsey, was inspired by a member of her community.
Alongside teaching, Dempsey owns a cheerleading gym in Georgetown. In recent years, the mother of one of her cheerleaders, Christy Merryman, created a prom dress store called “Lynnerati”, in Lynn to ensure high school students have the ability to dress up for prom.
In some cases, prom dresses can cost hundreds of dollars, but at Lynnerati, students can try on gowns and take home them for free, as they are all donated.
Dempsey said last year she realized that the NHS could lend a helping hand in Merryman’s efforts to make the typically expensive dance more affordable, and thus the Triton prom dress drive was born.
Last year was a hit, with approximately 45 dresses collected at Triton, something that Dempsey said inspired its return this year.
“We had a lot of success with it last year, and after that we decided to definitely give it a go again this year,” she said.
Merryman said she was appreciative of the generosity of Triton students.
“To receive dresses like this from another community, I was so happy, and it felt so good,” she said.
While last year the majority of the dresses collected were donated to Lynnerati, some were offered to Triton students, something Dempsey said was fulfilling.
“It was really fun last year to see them bringing in the different styles of dresses. And, we actually had a couple of situations where some specific teachers reached out to me in the building that there were students that wanted to come and look at the dresses available prior to us making outside donations. So, it was great for me to be able to assist with that as well,” she said.
So far this year, the drive has yielded roughly nine dresses, a number Dempsey expects to rise in the final weeks of the drive which will wrap up at the end of the month.
“It usually picks up around this time when they’re shopping for this year’s dress. So, I would suspect that our busiest couple of weeks are probably coming up between now and the end of the month,” she said.
Regardless of the outcome, Dempsey said seeing students step up during the drive has been inspiring.
“It just has been really cool to see the kids want to give back and also want to participate in something that there’s no immediate gratification for them besides just doing something good for somebody. So, it’s been really nice to see them get excited about that,” she said.
While the majority of the donations will once again be going to Lynnerati, Merryman said she encourages anyone able to arrange an appointment and stop by the shop to do so, including Triton students.
“If you can come, come. I don’t care if you live in Lynn, Swampscott, Marblehead, Triton. Wherever you live, if you can get here, come and enjoy it,” she said.