A scandal at a California high school has a teenage yearbook editor apologizing for writing a nasty article about the length of cheerleaders' skirts today. The school is refusing to hand out 600-some copies of the books until she re-writes the article, sans references to the girls' legs. And all I want to know is why some kid is being blamed for this colossal catastrophe.
It's a yearbook. A keepsake. And they put the final copy in the hands of a KID?
Hellllllo. Problem solved.
Yeah, yeah. Let's empower kids. Let's not censor kids. I gotcha.
But I also have a wee bit of common sense. And I haven't been out of high school so long (hush YOU) as to have forgotten the reality of how a yearbook development process works. The kids do a lot of hard work. They hand it over to an advisor, who reads it over, then passes it along to the printer. Kids are empowered, but there are checks and balances, and the thousands of dollars spent on the printing of a lifelong keepsake do not go down the drain over one kid's stupid mistake. Again, I say, problem solved.
The issue in California seems to be over this one kid who wrote a rant about cheerleaders' propensity for wearing rather short skirts. Paired with pictures of the cheerleaders during a routine, with their skirts hiked up high, the article includes comments saying they show "more leg than Daisy Duke" and are "dolled up in micromini uniforms."
Not the worst stuff I've ever read, but it all could have easily been avoided with a little action from an adult advisor. Heck, a certain member of my senior class whined her way out of being listed as "Most Annoying" in the senior superlatives section of our yearbook by, ahem, annoying the adult yearbook advisor about it. It worked for her . . . could have worked for these girls.
What do you think? Is the blame being put in the right place here? Is it the teen girl who wrote it to blame or should there be adults overseeing the final product of such important documents?
Image via Adult Services Monrovia Library/Flickr