What the…? And all this time I thought Florida was a bastion of religious and Republican furor that encouraged things like homeschooling and school vouchers to get kids away from the evil public schools!
Citrus: School dance turns teen away
Steven Goforth says he spent $140 in clothes and tickets to the homecoming dance. His friend, Samantha Kelley, a freshman at Citrus High School, had invited him to come along.
The dance, held in the school’s cafeteria on Oct. 13, was supposed to be a semiformal event. The theme was “Disco Like a Hurricane.”
Steven bought new boots and a pair of blue jeans. He couldn’t make up his mind on a dress shirt so he bought two. He filled the gas tank on his Buick. Everything was set and ready to go.
But the night before the dance, Samantha’s mom, Theresa, got a call from the school.
Her daughter was not allowed to take Steven to the dance because he was not a student at Citrus High. Steven, who is 16, is homeschooled.
Samantha wound up taking her cousin, who was let inside – no questions asked – even though at the time, she was a student in Michigan.
Oh. OK. I get it now. They’re afraid the girl (who is a student there) might bring a terrorist.
“The dances are a school function,” Hilgert said. “Principals get nervous when you have someone in the dance that you don’t know any background information on.”
Like most education stories with attention grabbing headlines there are two sides to this story. I think you’ll find that this is policy at many schools around the country. School dances are designed for the students who attend a specific school, not others. In the past their have been problems with older students from other schools sneaking in alcohol and participating in other unhealthy and/or unsafe behavior. There have also been cases of high schoolers bringing much, much older dates which is seen as inappropriate and a potentially dangerous situation. Because of these problems many schools have decided it’s easier to simply require all in attendance to be students.
“Like most education stories with attention grabbing headlines there are two sides to this story…”
I agree with you in part. I think schools have every right to limit extracurricular activities such as dances to just the student body.
But you’re ignoring a very important part of this story. The home-schooled kid was denied entry while the out of state kid was not.
If a school is going to have rules, they should not use them against a specific segment of the population but apply them fairly.
I’m with 1. Another simple consideration might be liability.
It sucks, but I’d err to the side of “there’s a reason for it” than merely taking a pazizzle in someone’s fruit loops.
There was an incident at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh where a female student let in a two non students from the neighborhood to a Black Student Union sponsored dance. A member of the Basketball team starts talking with the female student . The two non students take exception to the attention. Shots are fired. Five Basketball team members are wounded.
I guess incidents like this are what the school administration is trying to avoid.
Our public schools systems suck and they’re like the mafia
In this case I think a less slanted story would have been about how an out of state student got around policies to prevent non-students from attending dances. The way it’s exceprted it seems the answer should have been to allow the non-student to attend. If you read the full article it’s a bit more balanced. The school is not without fault though. They shouldn’t have allowed the cousin either and it should have been very clear on the tickets and on signs advertising the evnt that it was for students only.
This is not new. My parents went to different schools in the 60’s. They could not attend any school dances together, including prom, because both schools had a non-student policy.
“Another simple consideration might be liability.”
So why did the Michigan kid get to go in? With all the militia types up here, the constant stream of murders, and terrorists buying cell phones from Wal-Mart, we’re cut-throat dangerous!
it’s not necessarily the “evil” of public schools that turns away so many, it’s that they flat out suck ass, our kids have never been dumberer.
I don’t blame them. Homeschooled kids are creepy.
Withlacoochee Technical Institute
Who would let a kid from that school into a dance?
Seriously though, the school didn’t handle this well.
10. WTF????
Steven says: “Durka, Durka – Jihad!”
#12 “WTF????”
Ask yourself, who would you rather hang with: Bart and Lisa or Tod and Rod?
School regime to 16 year old homeschooler; ha ha ha ha you can’t come. If this kid was an illegal immigrant, the school would have rolled out the red carpet.
#10…12….WTF….the courts have ruled that Homeschooled kids are to be included in extra curricular activities at the schools in their districts. Including sports, gym class, music, art and dances. The parents of homeschooled kids still pay school levey taxes, even if their kids don’t attend the schools, and the Appeals Court has ruled they MUST be accomadated.
#16, You’re on your game. I was going to mention the (almost) exact same thing.
Joshua is wrong as usual. He said:
“….WTF….the courts have ruled that Homeschooled kids are to be included in extra curricular (sic) activities at the schools in their districts. Including sports, gym class, music, art and dances. The parents of homeschooled kids still pay school levey (sic) taxes, even if their kids don’t attend the schools, and the Appeals Court has ruled they MUST be accomadated (sic).”
There is no court ruling saying any such thing. Homeschooled students may, if a district chooses, be allowed to participate in activities that are not paid for from secondary funds. The decision is discretionary. However, students who are actual students get priority even then.
Here’s hoping the students at that school are getting better spelling, grammar and reasoning lessons than Joshua did.