HW 57 - Initial Thoughts on Prom

  I know that there are people who think prom is a nightmarish industrial atrocity. I don't know much about that opinion but I am curious to learn more about those opinions. At this point I look at prom as the last chance for a grade to say good by in a social setting where the social life of the school is reflected more than the academic part. I remember watching a commercial for an MTV special on prom ware a girl said, "Graduation is for our parents, Prom is for us." I have conflicting feelings about this statement. As I mentioned before, prom is looked at as a way to celebrate growing up with out adults (except there are chaperones). And I understand that desire to feel independent and celebrate getting out of high school. My only problem with this is that in the statement, "graduation is for our parents but prom is for us" the girl is saying that she doesn't value the academics represented in gradation. Wouldn't an adult version of us be more proud of our academic achievements demonstrated in our graduation ceremony then our social achievements demonstrated in prom? Perhaps there is something in-between. Maybe the right of passage is not into adulthood but somewhere in-between. A faze of life ware we are expected to be mature enough to get by but not love our academic achievements. For many teens, girls in particular, prom is a way of demonstrating there financial maturity, as they save up for their one lavish night.

  According to USA today prom can cost from $400 to $3,000. I have a friend who spent $2000 on shoes alone. So that runs the over all cost of her prom to probably $5000. I have heard countless stories of girls saving up for an entire year for a fancy dress and shoes and the ticket in alone. I am trying to not sound cliche but its because of the influences of the media. More specifically media triggered towards kids our age. That ended up being a cliche. Woops. Anyways, teens desires to feel and look like the celebrities portrayed in the media is completely understandable. We are surrounded with it so why would we not morph into. That is the only justification I can come up with surrounding the financial part of prom. As for me, I have a year until I need to deal with it. I must admit I like the idea of being treated like a celebrity and partying with my friends for an entire day. Who wouldn't? I am probably going to use cloths I already have simply out of stinginess not as an attempt of making some sort of statement. One other idea I have considered is taking advantage of this odd practice and applying for a scholarship ware you make a prom dress out of duct tape.

  When I was about 11 I was at summer camp discussing prom with some of the counselors who would have been my current age. One was saying how she wanted to have an anti-prom party and the other girl agreed with her reason but pointed out that she could make money off of the tradition they were both dreading blowing all of their money on by applying for a duct tape prom dress computation. I have done a little research on this and concluded that it is real. They pay girls to make prom dresses out of tape. At first I loved this idea. I thought duct tape could not cost that much. Its tape but I was wrong. My long time dreams of creating a dress of duct tape were crushed by the fact that duct tape coasts $5 a role so that puts the over all coast of the dress at $200 dollars. I think if someone is going to go to prom and spend tuns of money on a dress with the goal of being as unique as possible, they shooed do it in a way where there is a chance where it could make them money. 

Questions:

What ways are there to save money and still go to prom?

What physiologically drives parents and teachers to wish teens around them to follow in their foot steps even if they are not close to them? Particularly with prom.

What is the teacher and parent influence on the prom?

Why don't people just have their one party's and not charge up to $200?