At the Monday meeting on Sept. 28, High School Principal Chris Levy addressed students’ alcohol use at Saturday’s homecoming dance. Levy told students that chaperones found three small, empty whiskey bottles on the floor of the Black Box. Chaperones also found evidence of vomit in the girls’ bathroom.
According to Levy, administrators currently do not know which students consumed alcohol at the homecoming dance. During the Monday meeting, Levy said administrators had no way of knowing who consumed alcohol because no students had come forward with information.
“There was a line for the bathroom, but someone came in, and she was in distress; I guess she felt sick,” a junior, who was in the girls’ bathroom when a GDS upperclassman vomited, said. The junior spoke on the condition of anonymity in order to speak candidly without fear of disciplinary action. “I didn’t really know what was going on, but she went in the stall, and all her friends went in there with her.”
Senior dean Bobby Asher chaperoned the dance. “The immediate thought is always, ‘Are we safe?’” he said. “Our first concern is, ‘Is anyone in danger?’”
In an interview with the Bit, Levy also said student safety was his top priority. “I do not want any of us to carry the burden of something bad happening to any member of this community,” he said. “That is just not something I want us to have to live through.”
In the week leading up to the dance, administrators held two meetings—one with ninth-graders and one with tenth-, eleventh- and twelfth-graders—to remind students that the expectations in the student handbook applied at the dance. According to the student handbook, illegal users of drugs and alcohol “will be subject to the discipline appropriate to the infraction and the circumstances surrounding it, including suspension and expulsion.”
After the meetings, Levy sent a follow-up email to parents with a similar message: “Attending a school function while under the influence or bringing illegal substances on campus are considered serious violations of the school rules.”
In Levy’s Monday address to students, he said what happened the previous Saturday night was unacceptable, especially given that administrators took those precautions before the dance. “We are pretty certain that not only you but your parents understood those expectations,” he said.
Upon initial discovery of the bottles, Levy said, he considered shutting the dance down, but he ultimately chose not to because he “did not want the actions of the few to ruin the night for the rest.”
A student who spoke on the condition of anonymity to avoid disciplinary action said they drank alcohol before the dance because they wanted to have a better time. “Drinking does break down social barriers in a bit of a way,” the student said.
According to the student, they drank at a gathering before the dance to avoid bringing drinks to school. “You can’t be leaving bottles around, because it’s really just disrespectful to the school and others around you,” the student said.
An anonymous senior who was drinking before the dance said they knew students from all grades who were under the influence during the dance. The senior said they thought the number of students drinking decreased “as you go down the grades”; they speculated that the majority of seniors had consumed alcohol at various gatherings before the dance.
In the Monday meeting, Levy also called future dances—winter formal and prom—into question. Since the events at homecoming, Levy said he has discussed policy changes and potential cancellations of future dances with the rest of the high school administrative team: Assistant Principal for School Life Quinn Killy, Assistant Principal for Academics James Elish, Head of School Tori Jueds, and the deans—Steph Cordo, Anike Oliver and Asher.
“I feel like that is a bit of a bad look for GDS as a whole,” the senior said. “It’s like you can’t control your students enough, or at least teach them to be responsible enough, that you have to cancel school dances.”
Asher said shifting entry policy for future dances was another possible course of action. “There is talk about breathalyzing and about vigilance around bags,” he said. “You have to press pause and think, ‘Well, if they’re bringing things in, could we have been more vigilant in certain ways?’”
The senior said they didn’t think breathalyzing would be the most effective way to curb substance use. “I feel like people would be like, ‘Well, I can’t drink, so I’m just gonna get high instead, or I’m going to get more high than I would have been because I’m not going to drink and also be high.’ So I do think that’s gonna push people towards other substances.”
Asher said administrators are also concerned about pushing students to use substances other than alcohol, which is part of why the administration has not landed on a specific course of action.
“I am not asking you to be in charge of other people’s decisions, but if you see something, I need you to say something,” Levy said in his Monday address. “The choices you make have a material impact on this space. How you look out for each other influences the culture of this space. I want to be clear: The overwhelming majority of you did the right thing. You operated within the boundaries of the expectations that we’d set. You came, you had a good time, and for that, I’m extremely grateful.”
“I have to be honest, it erodes trust—there’s no question,” Asher said about the incidents at homecoming. “It’s not the end of the world—it’s not like I think these are people who have dark souls—but it would be untrue to say you don’t feel a little like, ‘Come on, one hour, just one hour.’”
Asher added that the GDS student community is so much more than what Saturday night showed.
“One of the reasons that I get a little emotional is how wonderful Friday’s [all-school spirit assembly] felt when I turned around and the seniors and sophomores were all picking up single pieces of pom-poms that were all over the field,” Asher said. “I know what great capacity all of our kids have, and I just want to make sure that we don’t ever diminish that.”