Dear DC Urban Moms and Dads,

As the sponsors of Capital Cotillion, we would like to extend an invitation to all children in grades 3 through 8 to participate in the 2008-2009 Dance and Etiquette Series.
We offer classes in the District and Maryland. For more information or to request an invitation, please call our office (301-320-0025). Further information is also available on our website: www.capitalcotillion.com.

We want to assure you that our program is open to everyone and provides a welcoming and congenial atmosphere where children can learn and flourish.

Sincerely,

Kristie McGehee and Michele Pollard Patrick

Thanks, New York. Your feedback is just so welcome. This topic was dead until you resurrected it. If you want cheaper classes, feel free to move on down, but leave your attitude behind.

I live in NY and read with amusement the outrage at $400/semester for signing up one's child up for classes that offer adult supervision, doesn't require your presence, feeds them a little , teaches/reinforces basic civil behavior and let's them play with their friends. Ladies, this is cheaper than babysitters. It's cheaper than the $650/semester for my kid to take 45 minutes/once a week of ballet/gym/taekwondo/music etc... and I'm obligated to stay in the frickin' lobby and wait.
As for the hurt parents who didn't receive invites, if you really want to join a class, why not write a nice letter to express your interest for little Bobby or Sue to take their classes? Unless you've tried this route and been rebuffed, all this talk about exclusivity is rumor and innuendo. They're probably sending out unsolicited invites to the most easily marketable group (not unlike the credit card companies, or the Ed McMahon Sweepstakes brigade). If you aren't interested, then you aren't interested. No one is forcing you to sign up for these classes. I do have to wonder how such invitations could have been received if they were unsolicited - who's the busybody handing out your addresses?

Capital Cotillion starts at third grade. The infamous Mrs. Simpson's at fourth grade.

do they participate with other kids from other schools but the same age as well? how much does this cost a year? how many years? isn't cotillion at 18 or something?

16:00 makes wonderful points, far better than I ever could. I completely agree with her/him. There is so much competition in our children's world, from teams to grades to whatever. It is so easy for some children to feel "better" than others. I know that children compare house sizes, vacation plans, clothes, etc., and it gets worse as they get older (my older child is 13). Why promote social competition -- based on meaningless criteria -- by involving your child in something like Mrs. Simpsons?

From context, I might know at least one of the moms the poster called a troglodyte. Her views are not in the mainstream.

Anonymous wrote: I thought what 15:05 wrote was lovely. She is from a privildged and proper background and is taking responsibility for raising well-mannered unspoiled children. Being a "deb" is not outdated

Amazing. Just amazing.

Hi 11:26. If you used spellcheck and stopped using the word lovely, it wouldn't give you away as easily.

I thought what 15:05 wrote was lovely. She is from a privildged and proper background and is taking responsibility for raising well-mannered unspoiled children. Being a "deb" is not outdated

Amazing. Just amazing.

Anonymous wrote:These "finishing" organizations are for those who want to be in them and care about such things. If you find them repulsive, then just ignor them. If you want your child to participate, but are not invited, ask a friend who is, for a letter of recommendation. I bet she will oblige.

Actually, these "organizations" are profit-making businesses. The "invitations" are a marketing spiel designed to make sure the people who apply will a) be likely to part with $400+ for something you could teach your children yourself and b) likely to recruit other people with no advertising needed by the cotillion operators.

As to the "Barbie" mom. Sounds like 4 yo would be just as happy with a princess party at a mall.

What does all this have to do with Beauvoir anyway? Do they get some kind of cut of the fees?

I am upset by these posts. A few moms shared how hurtful it was that some moms at local independent schools help get some but not all fellow students invited to finishing-school type organizations that are, in some way elitist/exclusionary. I think those types of organizations hurt our schools and our students. Exclusion is wrong. And it is completely silly, because there’s always someone who feels more elite than you and will exclude you. He’s a statement from page 58 of the 2002 official history of a Boston club I know a bit about, a statement that this forum discussion called to mind:

“It may come as a surprise that a graduate of Yale would, as Club President, usher in our modern period. Since our founding in 1851, every President but __, __ and __, had been a graduate of Harvard, and most of them either A.D., Fly or Porcellian. Not that ___ was unique in that respect.”

This refers to things that were happening in 1986. Is it acceptable to say, I like Yale people, some of my best friends are Yale people, but they don’t run my club? I think this particular statement in the book was a frank recognition that for a long time everyone had been expected to go to one college, join one of three school clubs there, and then join the social club that the people with our DNA and background always joined. Such a tiny world. I just think the world’s a bigger place than that. And that our elementary schools benefit when different kinds of people feel totally comfortable at them. A few people on this forum, who write to defend most students going to elitist/exclusionary dance/social training, may want to rethink that. I know you don’t intend to hurt others. But you do when you involve students in activities that others are not invited to join or where they may not feel welcome. Part of being good parents is doing the right thing. Keeping students out of elitist/exclusionary organizations that overlap a large part of the student body of their school, not hurting fellow members of communities, etc., is the right thing to do. One post said these types of places are things of the past. Most of us would probably agree. It would be better if all of us left them behind. As someone said, if you want to take dance classes, try the YWCA, or any other group that offers open admission and does not send out invitations.

Anonymous wrote:I wouldn't say "yuck." Nothing wrong with real debs. But 15:05 gives them a bad name. It's O.K. to be a poseur and a relic, but it's quite sad to be clueless about it. Read Fiona MacCarthy's "Last Curtsey," if you want to learn about the TIMELY demise in 1958 of the only persons who truly were debutantes - those presented to the Queen as such. Those were the young women to whom the term is most narrowly applied. And the real debutantes had a season, not a dance. My clubs, and 15:05's club, merely ape the term. Fortunately, my clubs had the decency to stop misappropriating this class laden term years ago.

Even 50 years ago, the debutante idea had lost its social purpose. Not only does Ms. MacCarthy describe how trivial the notion had become in a modern society, she explains why it needed to go away just when it did. That's even more true in our country. We never had a queen to present to, and don't need one. Women have the god given right to ride only side saddle. And they break no law by calling themselves debs. But neither group should expect the rest of us to take them very seriously.

So, let's continue having father-daughter dances. But, the next time 15:05 tells you she was a deb, just smile. Heaven forbid she should understand she's closer to being an alumna of a Knights of Columbus ball than being the real thing. As for the handful of Mrs. Simpsons who have managed to lumber into 2008, well, Ms. MacCarthy devotes more than a bit of prose to the Simpsons of her day. You'll bust a gut when you read about them. And the gift will keep on giving. You can laugh yourself into tears each time you take dc to Cotillion-Simpsonland next year and see all the preening 15:05s. You, and I will know proper Society killed the whole dang thing on March 18, 1958.

15:05 evoked "yuck." 11:26 evokes pity.

Please help me! How can I not chuckle at 15:05 and her pal, 11:26? 11:26 is so flummoxed by 00:42's refusal to curtsey reflexively before 15:05 that 11:26 feels she must stake her reputation by assuring us that 15:05 is from a "proper" background - unlike the rest of you. That sentence tells you everything you need to know about 11:26. A great writer can capture a subject's essence in a few words. 11:26 is a real Henry James (If you know anything about Mr. James' world-view, you get the inside joke). But I don't mean to sound ungrateful. A troglodyte or two can always be counted on to provide an easy laugh. Thank heaven that most of you who post here did not let your privileged backgrounds consign you to becoming mere toffs. Or, more accurately, toff-wanna bes. And I just have to ask, I can't resist: how does a little social training make kids "unspoiled?" And does it? When my friends went back up to school, a fair number made the point that, despite their escorts' "privileged and proper," "unspoiled" backgrounds, they seemed to view dance training as a license to forget that an escort's hand should stay where it's first firmly planted. Or, 11:26, were they merely exercising a birthright of privileged and proper boys? Enjoy Simpson next year. Too bad my dds are far too old for that now. I could use a good guffaw.

If you raise your children to be well-mannered, well versed in social graces, and well educated-- it will not matter what school they attended or extracurricular programs they were able to participate in. Money is not the source of class or social graces--it may help but is not the end all.

I thought what 15:05 wrote was lovely. She is from a privildged and proper background and is taking responsibility for raising well-mannered unspoiled children. Being a "deb" is not outdated nor is it an "aping" of British society just because one author says so. It is still a tradition in some echelons of American society as well and, when I was growing up in the 80s, it was still a season, and not just one dance. I bet it actually still is.

I say, let people make their own choices as long as they are not harming or being rude/nasty/dismissive of others. These "finishing" organizations are for those who want to be in them and care about such things. If you find them repulsive, then just ignor them. If you want your child to participate, but are not invited, ask a friend who is, for a letter of recommendation. I bet she will oblige.

I wouldn't say "yuck." Nothing wrong with real debs. But 15:05 gives them a bad name. It's O.K. to be a poseur and a relic, but it's quite sad to be clueless about it. Read Fiona MacCarthy's "Last Curtsey," if you want to learn about the TIMELY demise in 1958 of the only persons who truly were debutantes - those presented to the Queen as such. Those were the young women to whom the term is most narrowly applied. And the real debutantes had a season, not a dance. My clubs, and 15:05's club, merely ape the term. Fortunately, my clubs had the decency to stop misappropriating this class laden term years ago.

Even 50 years ago, the debutante idea had lost its social purpose. Not only does Ms. MacCarthy describe how trivial the notion had become in a modern society, she explains why it needed to go away just when it did. That's even more true in our country. We never had a queen to present to, and don't need one. Women have the god given right to ride only side saddle. And they break no law by calling themselves debs. But neither group should expect the rest of us to take them very seriously.

So, let's continue having father-daughter dances. But, the next time 15:05 tells you she was a deb, just smile. Heaven forbid she should understand she's closer to being an alumna of a Knights of Columbus ball than being the real thing. As for the handful of Mrs. Simpsons who have managed to lumber into 2008, well, Ms. MacCarthy devotes more than a bit of prose to the Simpsons of her day. You'll bust a gut when you read about them. And the gift will keep on giving. You can laugh yourself into tears each time you take dc to Cotillion-Simpsonland next year and see all the preening 15:05s. You, and I will know proper Society killed the whole dang thing on March 18, 1958.