Fraters Libertas

Consuming Prom

Finally, a school adminstrator (albeit private) is doing something. Principal Cancels Prom.

Brother Kenneth M. Hoagland had heard all the stories about prom-night debauchery at his Long Island high school: Students putting down $10,000 to rent a party house in the Hamptons. Pre-prom cocktail parties followed by a trip to the dance in a liquor-loaded limo. Fathers chartering a boat for their children's late-night "booze cruise."

Going as far as cancelling a prom is leadership. The kind of leadership that would be called "Judgemental" by many and the kind of leadership you would never see out of a public high school principal. One of the main reasons parents send their kids to parochial schools is so they don't have to deal with these trashy, consumerist elements of popular culture, yet it was going on big time:

Hoagland began talking about the future of the prom last spring after 46 Kellenberg seniors made a $10,000 down payment on a $20,000 rental in the Hamptons for a post-prom party. When school officials found out, they forced the students to cancel the deal; the kids got their money back and the prom went on as planned.

But some parents went ahead and rented a Hamptons house anyway, Hoagland said.

Pathetic. For whatever reason, you don't hear conservatives talking much about consumerism and it's effect on our culture, but it is every bit as damaging as any of the other myriad social pathologies we have to deal with.

And the Brother had something to say about it:

It is not primarily the sex/booze/drugs that surround this event, as problematic as they might be; it is rather the flaunting of affluence, assuming exaggerated expenses, a pursuit of vanity for vanity's sake--in a word, financial decadence," Hoagland said, fed up with what he called the "bacchanalian aspects."

Of course, not everyone is happy. Some parents are now bitching that--you guessed it--this is unfair.

Edward Lawson, the father of a Kellenberg senior, said he and other parents are discussing whether to organize a prom without the sponsorship of the 2,500-student school.

"This is my fourth child to go through Kellenberg and I don't think they have a right to judge what goes on after the prom," he said. "They put everybody in the category of drinkers and drug addicts. I don't believe that's the right thing to do."


Mr. Lawson is representative of a certain type of parent that Catholic schools have to deal with--the parent who sends their kids for the prestige and social standing and could care less about the values. I love the irony in his statement that he is upset that they are judging this behavior because he doesn't believe that's the right thing to do. Well who are you to judge them?--someone could ask.

Catholic schools need to let parents like Mr. Lawson know in no uncertain terms that him and his kind are not wanted. Tell him to take his money and find a secular school that will get your kid into a good college. Catholic schools are supposed to be about shaping the values of young people, not about getting them into good colleges so they can join the hard-driving, grabbing-dough-with-both-fists secular society.