On Monday night, Dance Marathon announced that a record number of more than 300 staff members and more than 1,200 dancers are signed up to participate in DM 2011. This is a 100-person increase from this time last year, when a total of 1,400 dancers and committee members planned to participate. It is likely that this increase is due to some extent to DM’s new, exclusively-online registration system. Overall, we commend DM for this development. DM is an immensely popular event that many students list as defining their NU experience, and since we are always aiming to increase the sense of community on campus, more people participating in DM is a good thing. Not to mention that the more students participate in DM, the more money they can raise for the beneficiaries. If all of the dancers currently signed up raise the minimum $400 per dancer, they will raise $480,000 that goes directly to the beneficiaries, not including funds raised by committee members or corporate donations to the event.

However, we encourage the Dance Marathon executive board to remember that sign-ups do not translate into participants. The scale of the event necessitates that participants sign up more than a quarter in advance, and especially for freshmen, this means students don’t have much time to think about their decision to participate in DM ahead of time and to consider the realities of raising $800 per couple and dance for 30 hours the weekend after the end of winter quarter classes. Last year, about 300 dancers dropped out between sign-up time and DM weekend. The Daily believes that the entirely electronic system might make it easier for participants to register without thinking seriously about their decision (especially since a significant percentage of registrants are freshmen), leading to greater drop out rates later in the year. We hope that DM leaders continue their efforts to hype up DM to participants and to make extra efforts to help dancers and committee members raise their money ahead of time and keep up their enthusiasm over the next few months.

To the dancers and committee members currently signed up-stick with it. If you didn’t sufficiently research DM before you submitted your paperwork and registration fee, talk to people who have participated before and learn the facts so that you have plenty of time to raise your money and plan for DM weekend. Things do come up, but not for 300+ people. So what is going to be more essential to DM’s success this year than increased registration is an increased retention rate.