With the passage of H.B.415, Highland lost much of its funding. The biggest impact on students is no more free dances. It looks like there might not be many dances at all.
The Halloween stomp was canceled just days before it was supposed to happen, the administration citing too few students bought tickets beforehand, meaning there wasn’t enough money to fund the dance. Just ten students bought advance tickets.
The question now is will this trend continue? While Prom and Winters seem to be firmly set, what about the rest of the dances? Those events aren’t as big or important but still have a long and storied tradition in Highland’s history. Now that these dances are under threat; how did we get here?
The answer is H.B.415. Drafted by Representative Mark Strong (R-47) and overwhelmingly passed by the Utah legislature changed the law so that no public school in Utah can charge a blanket fee to all students.
Strong has noble intentions. He believes that a kid should be able to go through high school and not have to pay a dime, granted that that kid wasn’t involved in any extracurricular activities, but he’s misguided in his approach.
Schools need money to run. That’s the nature of the world we live in. The main way they get that money is through taxes, specifically property taxes. This should, in theory, be okay, and for many schools is more than enough to cover these costs.
The thing is, not every house in Utah costs the same. A property in the Canyons School District, which is where Brighton is located, on average is worth $703,000 in 2024, according to the Canyons School District website. In the Salt Lake City School District, the average house costs $576,000, according to the SLCSD website. That’s a difference of $127,000 on the average house. The more expensive a house is, the more money it pays in property taxes. The more property taxes people in the district pay, the more money goes to the school.
You can see how not all schools are equal when it comes to funding.
This means that cutting funding for schools disproportionately affects poorer schools, and the students that they serve. It cuts activities for students and makes school less of a center for community, which is a key part of public high schools.
H.B.415, and bills like this, are pushed by legislators who are career statesmen, not educators.
“I’m not an educator. Politician by trade,” Strong said.
They come in with good intentions and lofty ideals about how public education should work, but if politicians don’t stop jumping in without letting the people who are in the mess of public education their whole lives lead the charge, then bills like this will continue to pass, where an integral part of Highland’s culture is under threat so that an ideal can come to fruition.
This bill hurts high schoolers. It makes the income inequality in Utah even more clear, and takes away parts of high school that make high school worth it. Sure, school dances aren’t necessary. It won’t teach you statistics, it won’t boost your grade, and it certainly won’t help you do your homework. But what it will do is make high school more enjoyable. Dances are a source of fun and community in a world of increasing boredom and isolation. They’re important because they ease the pain of high school. I think that’s worth a simple $30 fee.
