No Costumes At Concord School District Elementary Schools? Boo!

CONCORD, NH — Parents of families with students in elementary, middle, and high school are facing some issues this Halloween since elementary school students have reportedly been banned from wearing costumes this year — but Rundlett Middle School and Concord High School students are being allowed to as part of Spirit Week celebrations.

A couple of parents have contacted Patch about the inconsistency, with their younger children upset they cannot dress up like the older students. As everyone knows, Halloween has become a holiday for younger kids, not older children. And even though there does not appear to be a written SAU 8 policy about the policy, dressing up for the holiday has been inconsistent.

Last year, Broken Ground Elementary School students were allowed to dress up for the holiday. This year, however, Kyle Repucci, the new principal, put the kibosh on that. In an email earlier this month to staff, he wrote, “Unfortunately, I will not be able to pull off a Halloween dress-up day. This topic was reviewed with other elementary principals, and it isn’t something we do in the schools.”

Students at Rundlett, however, will be allowed to wear costumes this year if they like.

In a memo, Jay Richard said students could wear outfits so long as masks were not worn and they were not a distraction to learning. He added, “Nothing too scary (no blood/fake weapons).”

Concord High School students are dressing up as part of “Halloween Spirit Week,” according to a Facebook post. The school said, “costume/dress up (school appropriate, no masks).”

A search through district files revealed that there does not appear to be a uniform Halloween policy.

Neither Kathleen Murphy, the superintendent of schools at SAU 8, nor Terry Wolf, the public information officer, returned an email requesting clarification or answering questions about the issue.

Do you have a news tip? Please email it to tony.schinella@patch.com. View videos on Tony Schinella's YouTube.com channel or Rumble.com channel. Follow the NH politics Twitter account @NHPatchPolitics for all our campaign coverage.