GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — A metro Atlanta middle school is backing off their plan to charge children money to wear a Halloween costume, according to a notice on their website.
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Bay Creek Middle School in Gwinnett County posted an announcement Oct. 11 on the school website that students on can pay a $10 cash-only fee and turn in a permission slip to be allowed to wear costumes on Halloween, which is Monday, Oct. 31.
The school reduced the fee to $2 after some outcry by parents Thursday and announced Friday morning that they had canceled the plan all together.
The school did not initially say where the cash payments would go or if the payments were part of a school fundraiser. On Friday morning, the principal sent an email to families that apologized for not explaining that the fees were meant to be a fundraiser to benefit school clubs.
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“I want to apologize for any confusion the original plan may have caused. I want to assure you, the idea behind charging a fee to wear a costume was pure; we wanted to raise money to support our school’s clubs,” principal Jeremy Reily wrote. “However, we did a poor job determining how much the fee should be and explaining what the money would be used for.”
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Reily said that students will now be allowed to wear their costumes for free as long as they are school-appropriate.
Parents on social media came down both for and against the idea of charging to wear a costume. Some parents pointed out that many schools charge kids $1 to wear hats or fun outfits like pajamas on some days.
“Charging kids to dress up on Halloween is ridiculous. If the schools need more money (and they do) put it on the ballot, this is nonsense,” Zach Podenski wrote on Facebook.
N’neka Taylor disagreed.
“As long as the money is accounted for and goes back to the school they aren’t doing anything wrong,” Taylor wrote. “This is no different from any other fundraiser.”
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