For over a decade, elementary school girls have invaded the cafeteria for a few hours each February, dressed to the nines, twisting and twirling with their dates as Taylor Swift blares through the speakers.

For those few hours on a Saturday afternoon, Mr. Matt Schweinberg isn’t a social studies teacher. He isn’t a basketball coach. He is just “Dad.”

“Life gets so busy sometimes that it’s hard to stop and just give all your focus and attention to [the] people in your family,” Schweinberg said. “Rarely do you get three hours blocked off where it’s just like, ‘Hey, this is going to be you and me. We’re going to have a lot of fun, with nothing else on the calendar.’ That’s what’s kind of fun about it.”

For the last eight years, Schweinberg has attended the Student Council’s annual Daddy-Daughter Dance, first with his oldest daughter, Anna, and later with his youngest, Emma.

But this year will be different. The dance is only for elementary-aged students, meaning Anna, now 12, has aged out of the event.

“She’s kind of bummed because she can’t go this year,” Schweinberg said. Meanwhile, Emma, 9, is thrilled—this will be her first time at the dance without having to share the night with her older sister.

But as much as Emma looks forward to the dance, Schweinberg knows these moments are fleeting.

“Last year,” Schweinberg said, “Anna kind of ditched me for her friends.”

Gallery • 3 Photos

Social studies teacher Mr. Matt Schweinberg has been attending Student Council's Daddy Daughter Dance, the organization's biggest fundraiser, since his oldest daughter was a preschooler. Photos Courtesy of: Mr. Matt Schweinberg

A Tradition Years in the Making

Since its launch in 2012, the dance has become a staple event in the school community. Former Student Council sponsor Mrs. Addie Ince introduced the idea after her brother raved about a similar event he attended with his daughter in the suburbs.

“When I became the Student Council sponsor and had a daughter myself,” Ince said, “I thought this would be kind of a neat thing to start at Normal Community.”

With an initial goal of 100 attendees, Ince quickly realized the event would become a tradition. The first 100 spots filled within five days, and the dance has been at capacity ever since.

“This community is very willing to support the school and do activities like [this],” Ince said.

An Exclusive, Special Evening

While the event was initially open to the public, its growing popularity has made invitations exclusive.

“Because it’s so popular now, what I’ve done for the past 10 years is use last year’s list,” Ince said.

Each year, she sends out a “save the date” to returning guests, adjusting for those who have aged out. A few additional invites go out through elementary school contacts, but, Ince said, “we usually fill up before we have to market it too much more.”

With attendance capped at around 140, the dance provides a rare, intimate opportunity for fathers and daughters to spend quality time together.

“I think relationships with dads and daughters are special,” Schweinberg said. “Just to take time to celebrate that a little bit and build those memories is a lot of fun.”

Memories That Last a Lifetime

The evening’s festivities include a DJ, dancing, an ice cream sundae bar—complete with unlimited toppings from Carl’s Ice Cream—and the ever-popular photo booth, where Mrs. Jennifer Kelly snaps pictures for guests to take home.

“They do a good job—they take the pictures at the beginning, print them off, and put them in a little frame,” Schweinberg said. “My girls, like, all over the room, have the several years that we’ve gone to the Daddy-Daughter Dance together. It’s just been a really good, fun memory for us to have.”

That printed photo has become a key part of the night—but it also comes with a challenge.

“It’s actually the biggest stressor of the whole dance itself,” Ince said. The race to print and distribute the photos within an hour adds to the logistical demands of the event.

Ince felt strongly about keeping the printed photos a priority.

“This day and age, people don’t print off pictures,” she said. “How many of us have pictures of our parents on our phone? But if you were to ask, ‘Can I have a physical picture?’—very few people have that. I wanted them to have something tangible.”

More Than Just a Dance

While the event is a fundraiser for Student Council, proceeds are also donated to the school’s Promise Council, which helps provide resources like P.E. uniforms and calculators for students in need.

“At first, we donated to charities like St. Jude and March of Dimes,” Ince said. “But as the needs in our school community grew, we decided to put the funds back into our own school.

For Schweinberg, the dance is about more than just the decorations, the DJ or even the framed photos. It’s about carving out time, year after year, for moments that will last long after the final slow song.