Students at Hastings School won’t be decorating pumpkins, drawing witches or wearing costumes to class after administrators decided not to celebrate Halloween this year.
CTV News has confirmed the celebrations have been cancelled. The school also cancelled their annual winter concert.
"The principal of Hastings has cancelled all Halloween events, including parties, candy, celebrations," said Stephen Meleck, a parent of one of Hastings’ students.
Meleck said the change isn’t sitting well with him. "I'm pretty upset. I'm pretty worked up."
Meleck said school officials are also cancelling the annual winter concert and replacing it with an evening of African drumming.
“It's taking Halloween and Christmas away from the kids,” said Diane Traverse, a parent. “It's always been there. How do you now change it all of a sudden? It's like saying that it's something wrong."
Some parents hope the school will make it right. "We've created an online petition,” said Meleck. "We're hoping with that, we can get enough signatures to bring it to the principal’s attention so he reconsider bringing those events back."
Louis Riel School Division issued a written statement. “Halloween and Christmas continue to be valued traditions in many of our schools. That said, we do not mandate that schools should or should not have activities that directly reflect these traditions. If there are concerns we encourage parents to communicate with their school administration.”
- With a report by Jon Hendricks
