`It does "take a village" to hold Lakeview prom`

                     Nick Hildebrand/Herald

Lakeview High School junior Jerrod Hart and his dad, Jim, put the finishing touches on a Bourbon Street tattoo parlor in preparation for the school's prom Friday. Remaking the gym for the Mardi Gras-themed dance is a community effort.

By Nick Hildebrand
Herald Staff Writer

There's no talk of "inappropriate" dresses or disgruntled students holding their own "alternaprom" at Lakeview High School this year. Everyone's too busy trying to recreate the Big Easy in the gym before Friday night.

If you think this year's Mardi Gras-themed prom is just for the kids, think again. Though the junior class is responsible for planning and paying for the prom, it takes a village to raise an imposing 80-foot-long riverboat and reconstruct a section of Bourbon Street on a basketball court.

Lakeview's annual formal dance is a community effort, according to prom advisers Ken Gaydos and Glen Powell. Parents, students, teachers and others working at the school Wednesday night agreed.

"People really get into this project. People get excited," said Gaydos, who teaches art.

Planning for the event began almost as soon as the lights went out on last year's prom. The junior class plans the theme and, for the last few years, has chosen the high school as the venue. After that, everybody gets involved.

"Parents, people in the community, students, everybody donates their time and materials," Gaydos said.

"A lot of time," Powell added.

To call what they're doing decorating is misleading. This isn't hanging streamers and dimming the lights; it's major construction. Gone are the bleachers and ceiling beams, hidden behind plastic sheeting, building facades and the coup de grace -- a sternwheeler mockup designed by Dan Shindledecker of Sandy Lake.

When the lights go down Friday, it will take a trained eye to see that the section of Bourbon Street -- complete with balconies and a tattoo parlor -- is made out of cardboard and 2-by-4s.

With the riverboat as a background, the grand march will seem like a walk along the New Orleans waterfront. The bougainvillaea comes in the form of plants donated by Brothers Nursery, and a disc jockey will spin records on a stage made up like a garish float.

"It's almost a shame to put all this effort in and only have it up for one night," Gaydos said.

But the buildup to that one night serves a lot of good purposes, he said. Working on the prom provides a good meeting ground for the community, teaches some important skills nd gives kids and parents a chnce to do something togheter, Gaydos said.

"You get to spend some time seem like a walk along the New But the buildup to that one with them," said one parent as she watched father and son Jim and Jerrod Hart hang a colorful dragon on a the tattoo parlor's facade.

Back to TOP // Herald Prom 97 page // Herald Local news // Herald Home page

Updated May 3, 1997
Questions/comments: herald@pgh.net
For info about advertising on our site or Web-page creation: advertising@sharon-herald.com