Cinderella Project

Chinatown

It's not very often that I read an article and immediately have strong feelings about it, but lo and behold, this morning in the WSJ, such an article did appear. Click here to read.

In short, the objective of the Cinderella Project is to collect donated prom dresses and shoes so that underprivileged girls have a chance of attending the prom dressed appropriately. This is a very nice idea and probably thought up by someone whose heart was in the right place. However, I think this is too fluffy. It's a "nice to have", rather than a "must have". I would much prefer to donate to a program that encourages these girls to do better in school.

I am a firm believer in earning your own rewards, so if you want to have a nice dress for prom, then you should have to work for it. Maybe these girls could have saved money, or earned some pocket change by doing chores. Or, maybe the gowns should be rewarded to the girls who do the best academically, etc. In any case, they should have to earn the prom dresses somehow, not just be handed them on a silver platter.

These programs build up a sense of entitlement as in - society owes me a prom dress because I can't afford to pay for it. No one owes anybody anything. People donate dresses out of the goodness of their hearts.

Also, it should be noted that prom is NOT mandatory. If the girls don't have enough money for a dress, just don't go. Is it really that tragic? The answer is an emphatic no! They will survive. I didn't go to my high school prom and saved a ton of money that would have been used to purchase a dress, shoes, a bag, a corsage, etc. When they're older and have their own jobs, they can buy whatever dress they want. They need to be taught that instant gratification is not necessary a good thing.