Martinez devastated by the Cadet Ball cancellation

The Cadet Ball, a yearly dance held by the JROTC program was canceled this year due to Covid-19, several JROTC students were devastated by the news. One of those students was junior Jessica Martinez. 

““I was extremely involved in planning the ball this year. It was stressful but I really enjoyed it,” Martinez said.

This year was going to be special for the JROTC program because they had planned on attending the Cadet Ball at Hotel Madison, a hotel which was made in early 2019. 

“I was in the ball committee, which is a group of students that plan and prepare the ball,” Martinez said.

The ball committee helped with many things in the process of the planning of the ball. They helped with the food, the decorations and, for Martinez, the seating. She had to seat about 180 people who were coming to the ball. Martinez also helped Sergeant Major keep track of the people who were planning to come. In addition to maintaining the entire event guest list, Martinez had to keep track of her own. However, this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity led to disappointment for Martinez and her boyfriend.

“I [had] invited my boyfriend this year and he’s going off into active duty after he graduates this year, so he probably won’t make it to the ball next year and I’m so sad about it,” Martinez said. 

This whole process took so much time out of the students and to have it all taken away from them was devastating. 

“We’re not doing a ball this year nor any other JROTC events such as camps or award ceremonies. We have a summer camp every year but I don’t know if we’re even doing that, it wouldn’t make sense considering we can’t even have practice,” Martinez said.