SEQUIM — Freakin’, flashlights, rebels, rules. They’re clashing at Sequim High School, just as teenagers have always chafed at limits on their liberties.
The theme of last Saturday night’s school dance, “fire and ice: opposites ignite,” could also describe the dispute over Sequim High’s dance policy.
The rule, put into effect this fall, requires students to dance “face to face and leave some space.”
The rule is principal Shawn Langston’s response to what students call “freakin'” and “grinding,” dance moves that he said had sparked complaints from students and their parents.
Such suggestive dancing could lead to the shutting down of a dance, Langston warned.
Gig Harbor High School did that earlier this school year: Officials stopped a dance in progress and sent everybody home.
But at Sequim High the rule “is losing us money,” Sam Schwab, 16, told the Sequim School Board.
Schwab was part of a small but passionate group of sophomores who spoke at the board meeting just before Saturday’s dance.
The event was supposed to be a major fundraiser for the sophomore class, but the “leave some space” policy has cast a pall over school dances, said Chase O’Neil, another sophomore.
“People hear that no one’s going,” and that creates a reverse snowball effect.
Ultimately, 190 tickets were sold to Saturday’s dance, according to a Sequim High School secretary.
That’s compared with 473 to last fall’s homecoming dance.
Since that event, “they have parents with flashlights. They’re called the freak police,” Schwab said.
The chaperones shine their lights on students and embarrass them, he added, in order to put a stop to any suggestive dancing.
“There are some kids who take it too far,” acknowledged Kris Lawrence, 15.
“All of us shouldn’t be punished.”
Anna Lebeaume, 15, asked the School Board for “a compromise, something where everybody can be happy.”
“Freakin’ is our generation’s dance,” Schwab added.
“It’s just swaying together. To parents, it seems a little bit too close,” Lebeaume acknowledged.
In a later interview, Schwab suggested relaxing the rule and allowing boys to dance behind girls, provided they don’t lean forward at more than a 45-degree angle.
To this, Langston and Port Angeles High School principal Scott Harker had the same response: This is a dance, not a geometry lesson, and school officials aren’t inclined to bring protractors onto the dance floor.
“The question is: Where do we draw the line?” Harker added.
