No Prom Date, No Worries: Minnesota Senior Takes Her Harvard Acceptance Letter Instead

Priscilla Samey will graduate from Harvard University in 2021. @prizxillas

A high school student made the most of not being asked to prom by taking her acceptance letter to Harvard as her date, leading to viral praise.

Champlin Park High School senior Priscilla Samey was accepted into seven Ivy League schools: Columbia, Brown, Cornell, Yale, Princeton, Pennsylvania and Harvard, which the Minnesota resident decided to attend on a full-ride scholarship.

https://twitter.com/prizxillas/status/858488658923593728

Samey’s Saturday, April 29, tweet has earned 29,000 retweets and 126,000 likes with many people applauding the soon-to-be college freshman, who gto the idea for the unique date from her sister.

“He stayed in the car most of the time,” Samey told BuzzFeed about her letter, that didn’t attend the actual dance with her. “He’s shy and also I didn’t want it to get trampled.”

She noted she was able to save on the traditional prom expenses, telling Mic that her dress was made by a family friend and was a tribute to her Togolese parentage.

“They all thought it was so funny and cute,” Samey said of her classmate’s reaction to her prom date. “I didn’t get any negative feedback like I thought I would and they all were very proud and supportive.”

Samey hopes to take up business law upon graduation from Harvard and will jump on the pre-law track by majoring in political science. Samey also will obtain a business administration degree to pursue her career.

Democracy needs journalism it can trust.

This election season, the stakes are higher than usual — and so is the pressure on newsrooms to soften their coverage, stay quiet, or just disappear. Independent reporting, the kind that answers to readers instead of advertisers or political pressure, matters more in a moment like this, not less.

For over 14 years, Atlanta Black Star has stayed independent and reader-funded. We have no corporate owner and no shareholders telling us what to cover or how to cover it. That independence is also our biggest vulnerability: nothing protects it except readers choosing to fund it directly.

Newspaper ad revenue has fallen more than 80% since 2005, and local newsrooms are closing at a rate of roughly two a week nationwide. When outlets go under in a moment like this, it's rarely the independent, reader-funded ones that get to stick around.

We know a request for support isn't why you came here. But without readers choosing to fund this work directly, the depth of reporting we can do at home and abroad shrinks along with everyone else's. If you're not in a position to give, that doesn't change how much we value you as a reader.

If you are able to, a recurring contribution does more for us than a single one-time gift, because it lets us plan the next investigation instead of just the next invoice. It takes about 30 seconds, no long form, no account. Thank you for continuing to support independent journalism and freedom of the press.

Back to top