HoCo Madness

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There was a scandal at the dance pre covid - alleged sexual harassment at the dance.

That was a different dance at Whitman, which was in the winter.

Elimination of the HoCo dance at Whitman was as described by a poster above. I also think that the PTA started organizing the carnival on the baseball field even pre-covid to try to create an alternative to all of the alcohol parties (like a “post-prom” idea).

To be clear, at Whitman there were always a huge number of kids who skipped the dance anyway - they did HoCo exactly like OP’s daughter did. A friend of mine graduated Whitman in the late 1980s and she said many kids dressed up but skipped the dance then, too!

The new carnival-in-lieu-of-dance format was supposed to cut back on some of that so it is sad it sounds even worse than when my kids were there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a freshman at Whitman and don't understand the history. My kid didn't do the busses and all that stuff because apparently "freshman don't get to do that." He did go to the game and the HoCo festival thing that happened after the game, which he said was boring. But why doesn't Whitman have a dance - is there a story there? Has all this other stuff gotten so over the top in part because there isn't even a dance?

History is that dance ended with COVID. The first year back, they didn't resurrect the dance. Instead they have a school-sponsored party on the baseball field after the football game on Friday night. That has now gone on for three years, and it seems like the kids enjoy it (bounce houses, etc.). On the Saturday, self-organized groups do these self-organized gatherings that involve some combination of dressing up (or down, depending how you feel about those dresses), dinner, trip to monuments, parties, etc. And without the dance to anchor it, the ugliness really comes through. Sounds like a lot of kids don't go overboard, and kudos so those with kids who don't transgress. To me, it seems like a parent-sanctioned weekend of debauchery - things going on that other weekends they'd frown upon.

A School wide party sounds like a lot of fun- much more fun than a dance where nobody dances. Do the kids enjoy it?

It sounds more inclusive but these parents are messing that up by creating these exclusive side parties.

+1

I heard most kids go to the dance for 30 minutes, not even a full hour. Snap some selfies and post pics on social media and leave. No one dances. It’s really lame. It’s all about the pre dance dinner and after party. I heard some parents rent limos it’s gotten out of hand. Yes, these after parties are not inclusive. Some are only for the popular crowd and exclude all the not so popular and nerdier kids. It’s sad it has come to this.

[Anonymous]

I think most of the posters grew up in poor school districts. This has been going on forever.

My HS was 10x what is done today.

[Anonymous]

Um yeah no this is not how HoCo went in my household.

Junior year. He wore an outfit from his closet. We dropped him off a school where he met up with his friends. He and four friends left around nine to go to a friend's house (parents home) and we picked him up at ten. No dinner. No party bus. A few iphone photos before he left.

Who is paying for all this for your daughter? Stop paying if you don't like it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Um yeah no this is not how HoCo went in my household.

Junior year. He wore an outfit from his closet. We dropped him off a school where he met up with his friends. He and four friends left around nine to go to a friend's house (parents home) and we picked him up at ten. No dinner. No party bus. A few iphone photos before he left.

Who is paying for all this for your daughter? Stop paying if you don't like it.

Oh also. We are in the DCC, not Whitman. Maybe that is the difference. Most kids can't afford to blow money like you describe. We never would have bought in Whitman - overwhelmingly wealthy and white.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There was a scandal at the dance pre covid - alleged sexual harassment at the dance.

That was a different dance at Whitman, which was in the winter.

Elimination of the HoCo dance at Whitman was as described by a poster above. I also think that the PTA started organizing the carnival on the baseball field even pre-covid to try to create an alternative to all of the alcohol parties (like a “post-prom” idea).

To be clear, at Whitman there were always a huge number of kids who skipped the dance anyway - they did HoCo exactly like OP’s daughter did. A friend of mine graduated Whitman in the late 1980s and she said many kids dressed up but skipped the dance then, too!

The new carnival-in-lieu-of-dance format was supposed to cut back on some of that so it is sad it sounds even worse than when my kids were there.

The carnival on the baseball field was post-Covid. My 2023 Whitman grad had the traditional homecoming freshman year. Whitman tradition was that only freshman and maybe seniors went to dance. Everyone else just dinner, monuments, etc. Sophomore year was nothing due to Covid. Junior and senior years were the carnival so this is year 3. A lot of kids go to parties, but by no means all. My DC went to friends houses where parents home. No alcohol or parties. Small gathering. But definitely a lot of skimpy dresses!

[Anonymous]

We didn’t allow our 12th grader to do the monuments just because of the driving. We don’t need high schoolers driving all over with multiple kids in cars on high stakes nights like hoco and prom. I would have been fine with a bus but there wasn’t one.

[Anonymous]

The schools really need to bring back the dance as the anchor event. A lot of this other craziness may fade away if the actual school sponsored dance returns.

[Anonymous]

WtF?!? No dance!?!?!

[Anonymous]

If they want to do a carnival theme, they should do it saturday as part of the traditional dance. Sure, have lots of fun carnival activities besides dancing, but homecoming dance is the main activity. This all sounds bizarre, they are getting dressed up to go to a dance when there isn't a dance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Um yeah no this is not how HoCo went in my household.

Junior year. He wore an outfit from his closet. We dropped him off a school where he met up with his friends. He and four friends left around nine to go to a friend's house (parents home) and we picked him up at ten. No dinner. No party bus. A few iphone photos before he left.

Who is paying for all this for your daughter? Stop paying if you don't like it.

Oh also. We are in the DCC, not Whitman. Maybe that is the difference. Most kids can't afford to blow money like you describe. We never would have bought in Whitman - overwhelmingly wealthy and white.

Whitman sounds so incredibly toxic on several levels because of the loads of disposable money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What happen to just grabbing dinner at a local restaurant and heading to Hoco? Why does one have to drive all the way into Washington DC to take some photos in front of the monument. When did that become a "thing"? I must have totally missed the memo.

I thought that’s what they do for prom, where the dressing up part is more formal. Isn’t HoCo just party dresses?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Um yeah no this is not how HoCo went in my household.

Junior year. He wore an outfit from his closet. We dropped him off a school where he met up with his friends. He and four friends left around nine to go to a friend's house (parents home) and we picked him up at ten. No dinner. No party bus. A few iphone photos before he left.

Who is paying for all this for your daughter? Stop paying if you don't like it.

Oh also. We are in the DCC, not Whitman. Maybe that is the difference. Most kids can't afford to blow money like you describe. We never would have bought in Whitman - overwhelmingly wealthy and white.

Whitman sounds so incredibly toxic on several levels because of the loads of disposable money.

I am the OP. I've long used this board for info on MCPS and college/university admission (the latter I'm not sure has been helpful, but that board is entertaining). These sorts of comments about Whitman frustrate me. To the person who said "We would never have bought in Whitman" - you have no idea how my family ended up in the Whitman district. Not everyone has the same narrative of "have kids, buy a house and base that purchase on the school district." We did not end up in our domicile that way. In fact, we didn't even choose it. And some might not consider us white, although some do (depends what school of thought you come from and what form you're filling in).

Sometimes, in condemning people's so-called "choices," people on here can really indicate lack of understanding that others' paths may not reflect theirs. It's a very narrow way of looking at things to assume all families are/were in the same situation as you, and thus any discontent they have is a result of them making different (i.e., wrong) choices. It's sanctimonious.

Back to the topic at hand, I agree the no dance thing is weird, and do wish they school-sponsored event (whether the dance, carnival or something else) was Saturday night so that kids who wanted something structured to do had that choice. I don't like what HoCo has become, and I think the person on here who said it's a parent problem is right - so would require collective parent action to change, which would take time, but is possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:WtF?!? No dance!?!?!

IKR?! I had no idea that some schools don’t do dances for hoco. And unlike at a PPs school, the kids do dance at the schools my kids went to homecoming at.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What happen to just grabbing dinner at a local restaurant and heading to Hoco? Why does one have to drive all the way into Washington DC to take some photos in front of the monument. When did that become a "thing"? I must have totally missed the memo.

I thought that’s what they do for prom, where the dressing up part is more formal. Isn’t HoCo just party dresses?

It is. Seems Whitman is going to excess for no reason. The fact that there is no dance and the kids are dressing up and planning dinner, pictures, and parties and calling it homecoming is just weird. Really it’s just any Saturday in the year and they are getting together with friends and partying. These thing don’t even sound homecoming adjacent.