By LINDSAY MCALLISTER

Mcallister@newsroom.byu.edu

An Easter basket on Timpview High School Junior Mandie Mack's front porch only meant one thing for her. She was being asked to prom.

She read the card. "Some bunny really wants to go to prom with you. To find out eggs-actly who it is, unscramble the letters in these eggs."

Her excitement over being asked to prom was only slightly overshadowed by her joy over a boy that could be so creative in asking her.

"It's so cool when they're creative," she said. "It shows they really care about impressing you, and it wouldn't be right if he just came up and asked me."

In most schools in the United States, however, being asked to prom over the phone or in the halls at school is the way it's done. No one expects anything creative.

Date dances at schools in Utah Valley are different.

Each school has at least eight date dances during the year. They usually switch off between girls' and boys' choice and range from a Monster Mash at Halloween to the traditional Senior Dinner Dance at graduation.

A typical date dance in Utah starts with a creative way to ask. Although some students, like Timpview High School Junior Seth Dobson, think this creative asking is a waste of time and money, others go all out to get the most creative and newest idea.

Local authors have even written books of ideas on the subject, listing hundreds of creative ways to ask someone to a date dance.

These ideas include the usual writing "yes" on a pizza, to giving your date a potted plant with a note attached that says, "I'd wet my 'plants' if you would go to the dance with me."

"I think asking to dances is a waste of time," Dobson said. "You usually know what they're going to say anyway, so it's stupid to make a big deal of it."

Dobson, however, is still expected to do it.

After the ordeal of asking is over, students begin planning for the date. A date dance in Utah, however, isn't just an evening affair.

High School students here must plan the entire day. Some students start with breakfast and stay together all day only breaking to allow their date to get ready for the actual dance.

"Sometimes I just don't have enough money for a day date," said Ben Magleby, a junior at Timpview. "But I still feel pressured to plan one."

Utah High School dances aren't only unusual because of the traditions of creative asking and day dates, students must also go in a large group. Going "single" to a date dance is just not done.

Most students, however, don't mind this tradition.

"They're just not as awkward," Mack said.

Magleby said he likes to go in a large group because if his date turns out to not be as fun as he planned he can still have fun with other people in the group.

This group date tradition where often twelve or thirteen couples go together supports The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saint's guidelines on dating as outlined in its "For the Strength of Youth Pamphlet."

The pamphlet suggests, "When you begin dating, go in groups or double date."

Spencer Magleby, a BYU professor of mechanical engineering, is also the bishop of the Pleasant View Third Ward. He said he encourages the local high school traditions of group dating.

+ "Most kids that age aren't socially ready to date one person," he said. "They might run out of things to say or feel awkward. Group dating solves these kinds of problems."

He said his only concern is that it has become so much of an expectation that if a student doesn't have a group they may feel ousted from the high school dating scene.

Most high school students don't date unless it is for one of these date dances, so without a group they just don't date.

Many of these local high school traditions are not unfamiliar to BYU students, especially those having the "freshman experience."

Anne Parkinson, 18, is a freshman from Provo majoring in pre-business. She moved to Helaman Halls her freshman year at BYU to have this freshman experience.

What she noticed, however, was that it wasn't very different from her days at Timpview High School.

"Everyone was so excited to be surrounded by Mormons they could date. They went crazy for the dances by asking creatively and planning marathon dates. It was different for me, I was surrounded by that in high school," she said.

For Utah high school students their multiple date dances, asking creatively to them and spending all day with their dates is not unusual, it's just a part of Utah culture.

"I do it because it's just what you do," Mack said. "And because it's fun."

Copyright Brigham Young University 26 Mar 2000