By Brianna Yang

This Saturday at prom, students may be surprised to spot the solitary college freshman in the mix of high school students. Due to a new prom policy change, Latin students will be able to take college students to prom under certain conditions.

Caroline Volgman, who will be taking that college freshman to prom as her date, said that the process in getting her date approved “involved a lot of fighting.” After her first request to take her boyfriend to prom was denied, several students petitioned to allow college students to be taken to prom as dates. The main concern of upper school faculty regarding this issue was the accountability of these college students. “Our concern was that we didn’t have much control over those college students. They could bring alcohol and what could we do?” comments Mr. Baer, one of the deans involved in this new policy change. However, after some deliberation, Upper School administration has enacted a new prom policy change that would allow students to bring certain college students to prom.

These college students must be Latin graduates under the age of 21 and has to have been in good disciplinary standing while at Latin. Mr. Baer explained that since Latin can’t hold college students accountable for potential negative actions, these students would have to be people with whom Latin has a relationship. In addition, the Latin student, the date, and their respective parents will have to sign a release form stating that the Latin student will be held responsible for the actions of their date. “If the date had done something horrid, the Latin student would run the risk of having to go before Honor Council,” notes Mr. Graf. Mr. Baer doesn’t expect that there will be a limit put in place on the number of college students allowed at prom in the near future because not many students take college-aged dates to prom anyways.

Student reaction to this change has been positive. Sophomore Grace Gardner comments, “I don’t see a problem with it. Students should be able to take whoever they want.” Another student, who has asked to remain anonymous, agrees that this was a good decision, but remarks, “However, responsibility must be taken for these graduates who return. This new privilege will make a lot of students happy, which is the goal, but it cannot be taken lightly.”