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The Highlights dance team is one of the Greenhouse’s hardest working clubs. The members put months of hard work into their Friday night halftime performances, and while their routines look effortless, they spend hours perfecting each move.
This year there are 12 members of this team: senior captains, McKenzie Kaplan, Erin Snyder, and Ava Worman; juniors, Ella McCune, and Maddie Peters; sophomores, Hannah Baskind, Ava Burr, Olivia Derecskey, Layla DiNardo, Olivia Frye, and Chloe Kennedy; and freshman, Lily Peters. Throughout the season the captains and upperclassmen have put an immense amount of work into creating fun, unique choreography, and each team member has done a great job at bringing their visions to life by practicing and cleaning these routines.
The practice schedule for the team consists of two-hour practices Monday, Tuesday, and Thursdays, and a three-hour full band rehearsal on Wednesdays. In addition to all of that, The Highlights attend every football game along with several band shows throughout the fall. These girls not only work extremely hard during practices, but they also have to manage their time well to maintain their outstanding grades, clubs, and other extracurricular activities. Sophomore member Olivia Derecskey shares, “I juggle challenging classes, clubs, highlights, and dance, all things which take up a lot of time. My secret to success is organizing my work and tasks by day for the week. It helps keep me focused and allows me to create a game plan for how to tackle it all.”
Although it can be difficult to manage practices with other activities, the team members find every second of it worth it, they explain that this is where some of their favorite high school memories come from and that they wouldn’t want it any other way. Sophomore Highlight Chloe Kennedy explains, “My favorite aspect of being on the team is how we all work together to get through long practices. It is so rewarding when we get to perform and show off all of our hard work. One of the best parts of the season for me was our Wednesday night practices, even though they can be very tiring, it is fun to work hard with all of my teammates, and we all get so excited seeing everything come together for our show that week.”
In addition to all of the work every team member puts into each practice, the Highlights captains take on many additional responsibilities and dedicate even more time to make sure everything runs smoothly and looks flawless. Senior captain Ava Worman mentions, “Being a senior in band let alone a captain is extremely difficult but also very rewarding. We are always trying to make sure the rest of our team is prepared for every game. We are responsible for a lot of the choreography, and we make sure the homecoming show is super entertaining and fun by getting props and costumes.”
The captains for the team are selected at tryouts each year based on important qualities and their goals for the team. One of the captains this year, Erin Snyder, adds, “Some qualities I think that make a good captain that resonate with me are being very understanding. I want people to feel comfortable and open to talking to me if something is going on, because if I were in their shoes, I would want to tell somebody something that's going on in my life that I trust.“ Having captains that possess such helpful qualities is vital to the team, and sets them up for success the whole year.
Overall, each and every Highlight puts in immense amounts of effort, but also has lots of fun with what they do and makes so many special memories throughout the season.
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