Dance Marathon began the process to chose next year’s charity on Feb. 10. There is a multi-step nomination and interview process.

Dance Marathon started at North in 2001 and at West shortly afterward. North and West’s Dance Marathon groups combined in 2003. Dance Marathon is a nationwide program not only limited to high school; many colleges do it, each choosing a different beneficiary. Niles West has a multiple-step process to select its charity. They look at many factors, like whether the charity already gets a lot of funding and which one they feel could make an actual change.

English teacher Dena Lichterman is one of the sponsors of Dance Marathon and has been involved with Dance Marathon for 17 years.

“The process for our charity selection is unique and different from how most schools select their beneficiaries. We first do an open call for nominations. Students, staff, community members and charities themselves can submit their charity for consideration. The executive committee members then meet on a Saturday in February and discuss all of the charities that have submitted applications… The students then narrow their selections and invite about four to five charities in to interview,” Lichterman said.

Dance Marathon executive Kisa Fatima outlines their selection process.

“We avoid organizations that receive a lot of funding. We look at their yearly budget, and we prioritize organizations with a lower budget during the selection. Organizations with budgets upwards of one million don’t tend to get picked. We also like to choose local organizations based in the Chicagoland area so that we have opportunities to volunteer directly with them,” Fatima said.

Dance Marathon also works in collaboration with Niles North High School. In most cases, the Niles North students will make a list of nominations with information and meet up with the Niles West students to discuss which charity to work with. Executives will usually go to that meeting, and they will narrow it down more from there.

“We first receive charity nominations, and once we have the full list, the North students will typically compile the nominees into a list with basic information about them such as where they’re located, what their goals are and more. Then, North and West students will meet at the Lit Center here at West,” Special Event Committee executive senior Suekaya Korel said.

Then the first round of voting starts; they choose three charities to see at the end of the meeting. The second round happens at North during April, where they pick between the three charities.

At the second round of charity selections, a representative from each of the three chosen charities will also be present.

“This provides us with the chance to ask questions about each charity’s goals, purpose for the donation and background. After this second round, we have the information needed to pick a final charity,” Korel said.