Halloween is often overlooked by other high schools, but at Cardinal Gibbons that is not the case. For years, Halloween Day has been an opportunity for students to dress up and participate in the school’s annual Halloween Costume Contest. This day of celebration has been a pillar tradition in the Gibbons community, and students have always dressed to the occasion.
Costumes From 2022 Halloween
However, this year will be different. On Friday, Oct. 13, the school announced that costumes would not be part of the dress code this Halloween. Instead, students and staff will have the opportunity to dress down in festive fall outfits for the whole day.
But why the change? Why switch costumes to a dress-down day?
Mr. Rogosich, the Dean of Culture here at Cardinal Gibbons High School, explained that there was a difference of opinions about the topic of wearing costumes on Halloween, thus resulting in a change to the dress code. Prior to the modification, three meetings were hosted by Mr. Rogosich to discuss alternative solutions. All of them were open to students and participation was encouraged. After those meetings, it was decided that having a dress-down day for this year’s celebration would be easier on all of the groups involved.
“What are the rules?…What’s too creepy? What’s appropriate?…And then sometimes on that day, it’s really, really hard to teach…You’ve got three inflatable dinosaurs in your room,” said Mr. Rogosich.
What it boils down to is that the day can be very stressful for the teachers, and understandably so. While some love the festivities, teaching in a distracting environment can be a lot to handle. It is also hard to determine what aligns with the dress code, and the over-the-top props do not help the situation. Thus, a decision was made to alter the style and layout of the day.
In past years, the school hosted a Halloween Costume Contest. During the day, time was set aside for the whole school to gather in the courtyard and parade around the front lawn in celebration. Participants in the contest were judged for several categories, such as best props, most creative, etc. The outfits were critiqued by a panel of teachers during the costume parade. The joyous time never failed to bring the community together here at Cardinal Gibbons.
The panel of judges from the 2022 Halloween parade write down their opinion on a Three Fairy Godmothers costume.
Regardless of this change in tradition, there are still a number of activities that students and staff can participate in. As students are no longer dressing up, the costume contest has been turned into a door-decorating competition. In addition, all advisories will hold a shared advisory party during the community time/advisory period on Tuesday, Oct. 31, complete with candy and food brought in by the students. A Halloween backdrop will be set up for pictures, located in the main lobby during the morning.
Overall, this will be a substantial change to our school’s tradition. While the costumes and parade will be missed, this marks a new chapter for Halloween at Gibbons, and will still be an enjoyable day, without all of the added stress.
