CB-VRSB bans middle school dances

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Posted this 2015-09-28 1:44 PM ADT (updated 2015-10-21 3:39 PM ADT)

Cape Breton Victoria School Board bans Middle School dances to promote Cohesion

This fall, the Cape Breton Victoria school board will move to the middle school model, which will include Grades 6 to 8, and using the transition to enact a ban on middle school dances.

On the advice of Dru Tomlin, an Ohio expert on middle school curriculum, the ban on middle school dances is to promote camaraderie, cohesion, and a positive school climate. The middle schools will be encouraged to hold alternate social gatherings, such as pep rallies and athletic events to achieve these goals.

An online petition has been started by Stefanie White, asking the board to bring back the dances. The petition was created 4 days ago, and already has over 1,000 supporters, and can be found HERE.

What do you think? Share your comments below.

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The board is trying to find activities that are "age-appropriate."

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Joe Ward Follow Me 2015-09-28 7:24 PM ADT Reply 1 0 I find it curious that Canada has to use experts from the United States in regards to the management of middle schools, or any level of schools for that matter. We don't have any educational experts in this country? While I'm not privy to the reasoning behind the decision, or the arguments for or against, when I googled Mr. Tomlin, I took note that he's from Westerville, Ohio, regarded as the "Dry Capital of the World". It is an area found by the Methodist Church, and built up around their university. I'm just wondering if their local values are highly conservative based on how closely tied the community is to a church - a church that created a town that is somewhat of an outlier in terms of rigid, conservative policy perhaps. As a second note, the major employer for the region is a major financial corporation and median household incomes there are twice the reported median for Cape Breton. I'm just curious how well the cultures and socioeconomic factors are aligned and if Mr. Tomlin's recommendations took into account these differences in our culture and economy specifically as it relates to the recreational and managed social activities available to students in that age bracket here. Brandon Ellis also commented with a great question on Twitter. He pondered if the school board had engaged the CBRM Youth Council for input into the matter. I think that would have been a fantastic idea. Let's hear the input from our young leaders. Richard Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-29 11:26 AM ADT Reply 1 0 You know, I wondered about the outside consultant from the US myself. Why did they have to engage him to reach this decision. Unless it's because they knew it would be controversial, so they are now able to deflect blame south of the border.
[comment deleted] Posted 2015-09-29 9:54 AM ADT
[comment deleted] Posted 2015-09-29 9:56 AM ADT
Tera Camus Follow Me 2015-09-29 10:52 AM ADT Reply 1 0 The decision to ban dances is the most ridiculous over-kill decision by board officials that has me shaking my head and remembering the movie Footloose. I don't understand why the principals and board members don't stand up for students and get a backbone. Instead of banning dances, expel the problem students who fight or drink or who get caught with drunks and ban those bad apples from future dances. Have more enforcement. Why punish the whole student body? It makes no sense. Dances at Sydney Academy (and I'm sure at other schools) were no different today than when I attended. There were fights, drugs, booze, police, student police (no professional security) and teachers, but we all survived. The dances were the places where we made life long friendships and had a lot of fun. The French school board, where my children attend or have graduated from, continues to have dances and so far, no major issues. English speaking students forbidden to dance at their own schools crash the events, but they are welcomed. It's sad the English school board are so backwards in their thinking. Richard Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-29 11:27 AM ADT Reply 0 0 Bingo! Joe Ward Follow Me 2015-09-29 7:59 PM ADT Reply 1 0 It would certainly be interesting to have the board report how frequent each of the schools have encountered some of the issues raised. It would be a big loss of fun events for the kids, especially if the situations they are trying to avoid don't occur very often in practise. Ergo, a data based decision making approach. I also think that it would be better to have a transitionary plan in place. I.e. They should not be suspending an event type until replacement activities are ready to be deployed. Alternatively, it might also have been a reasonable policy to simply allow the administrators of each school to make a decision for their school. Schools that do experience frequent issues might decide to suspend the activity, while those with no history of significant issues might continue to host the dances as usual. Rory Andrews Follow Me 2015-09-30 10:07 AM ADT Reply 1 0 This seems like a perfect example of some old folks shaking their fists and yelling "KIDS TODAY!" For some reason, older people love to think the world's going to hell, and kids are far worse than they used to be, lacking respect and huffing glue. I would bet money on this generation of kids getting into less fights, doing less drugs, and generally being more competent human beings than my generation or older ones were. I don't understand why people are allergic to the idea that things are getting better, but crime is down, quality of life is up, and kids today are actually better equipped to deal with adult situations than we ever were at their age. I understand Cape Breton demographics skew older, but that doesn't mean we have to force grampa politics on our kids, does it? Joe Ward Follow Me 2015-09-30 10:32 AM ADT Reply 0 0 I'm going to really need to look at some data. Last night some young guys in North Sydney at a place referred to locally as the "Pillverely Hills" house decided to stab each other. If there turns out to be a drug connection (go figure), I just don't remember "pill heads" being a prominent thing when I was coming up. And it wasn't that I was isolated from all things. I knew lots of people involved in "recreational" drug use - though it definitely wasn't my deal. So, it may be a function of bias on paying attention to some regional news here. But I'm not quite sure the young folks coming up around here are much better equipped for the world than past generations - with the exception of the availability of empowering technology... if they decide to take some of that up versus snorting or injecting pills... or whatever they do with it. If there's criticism to be had, from my perspective it's more about what data they relied on, if they consulted the right person, and if they discussed it appropriate with stakeholders... including the youth council. But I'll give the old folks some flexibility. They could probably totally trump this discussion by simply holding up picture of Hannah Montana next to a picture from any of Miley Cyrus' recent concerts. Drew Barrymore might have had her troubles, but she didn't celebrate them on a national tour. ;) If they do intend to provide alternative activities, that's fantastic. Sometimes a community with an overly unhealthy focus on alcohol as a centrepiece for most social activities becomes the norm (both adults and youth), but it doesn't mean there couldn't be reasonable adaptions. A young dance is more likely to evolve into adult "dances" or bars, and is less like to turn them into "Dancing with the Stars" super fans. So it's fun, but there can be tremendous benefits in bringing in other sorts of activities that have a social basis (any group), and a low cost, but don't necessarily have to be a "dance". Joe Ward Follow Me 2015-09-30 10:36 AM ADT Reply 0 0 With all that said, I'm still in favour of dances unless the board could provide a report on all the incidents that lead up to a decision to impose a ban - and that data was compelling. If they can't do that, then they haven't made a reasoned decision. Of course, there is absolutely nothing stopping the school from setting appropriate standards of clothing and being hyper-vigilant in watching out for underage alcohol or illegal drug use. I remember it being a very fun part of our growing up - with relatively few idiots acting up.
Jimmy Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-29 1:06 PM ADT Reply 2 0 Like other people who have read this post, my initial thought about this is that we have a new Footloose on our hands. There are two possible courses of action that I think are in order: 1. Get Kevin Bacon to sign the petition mentioned above. 2. Start a new petition to change all town names within the school board to Beaumont (the name of the place in Footloose where dancing was banned) IF dancing is banned. Side note on a completely separate matter: Richard - I tried the Ctrl+I to use italics but was unable to achieve my desired result. This severely dampers my (and many others) ability to stress sarcasm and use inflection in our typing. I feel this could be a powerful tool to add to Rory's arsenal. That is all, folks. Mathew Georghiou Follow Me 2015-09-29 9:59 PM ADT Reply 0 0 Whoa there Jimmy! Slow down now. Allowing people to use sarcastic italics in COMMENTS would relinquish far too much power to the masses :-) We need to tread carefully and only allow plain text in comments for now. Sarcastic italics, loud bold, and flamboyant colour is permitted in posts only. Of course, you could always SHOUT IT OUT ... but be careful because we are watching. SIGNED: The Mayor of Beaumont Jimmy Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-30 12:39 PM ADT Reply 1 0 Sarcastic italics are too much power? This is clearly textbook online oppression. The above comment should have the word "clearly" italicized to show that I now understand what you mean, but have noted so with a quirky sense of humour. Also I couldn't help myself as this was a subtopic of my previous post. I suppose that does make sense in order to avoid unnecessarily malign and fiendishly witty comments alike. I am glad to hear that italics are allowed in the body of an article. I have not noticed them to date but I am sure there are multiple examples that I have not taken notice of. Thank you for the reply Mayor of Beaumont (AKA Big Brother, the ever watchful eye). Signed: Concerned Ex-Citizen of Beaumont Richard Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-30 12:10 PM ADT Reply 0 0 On a side note, I looked for Kevin Bacon's contact info yesterday to invite him to join the debate, but couldn't find it. I suspect we wouldn't be the first town to try to drag him into commenting on teen dances. Joe Ward Follow Me 2015-09-30 12:17 PM ADT Reply 0 0 Walmart has a bacon-like product available for $2.47 a package. If the protest involves throwing something, perhaps that would be a more symbolic option than good ole tomatoes. Jimmy Lorway Follow Me 2015-09-30 12:45 PM ADT Reply 0 0 Does he have a twitter account? On a separate note, is a parody twitter account of this ruling a good way to raise awareness and gain some backing for reversing the situation?
Bob Willman Follow Me 2015-10-01 11:03 PM ADT Reply 1 0 Here in the States we have these so called experts in education using fear and scare-mongering to push their right religious agenda. Be very aware of these people. Once they get into the school district, they slowly start advocating for more and more restrictions on the children.