Four teenagers at a Georgia high school, which still includes segregated proms, are organizing their own integrated prom this year.
Georgia’s Wilcox County is the last county in the state where proms and dances are segregated by race, reported WMAZ-TV. In Georgia, schools do not host proms, but private groups, including parents, are responsible for them.
“We’re embarrassed, it’s embarrassing,” group of teenage friends, Stephanie Sinnot, Mareshia Rucker, Quanesha Wallace, and Keela Bloodworth told the station together.
“We are all friends,” Sinnot said. “That’s just kind of not right that we can’t go to prom together.”
They all go to Wilcox County High School, which has never held an integrated prom in its history.
“There’s a white prom and there’s an integrated prom,” said Bloodworth.
The segregation rule, she said, is strictly enforced.
“They would probably have the police come out there and escort them off the premises,” she added
The group of teens started a Facebook page about an “Integrated Prom,” which will raise funds for their dance. The page has generated 14,500 likes on Friday.
“We live in rural south Georgia, where not too many things change. Well, as a group of adamant high school seniors, we want to make a difference in our community. For the first time in the history of our county, we plan to have an integrated prom,” reads a statement posted on the Facebook page.
Wilcox County High School gave a resolution supporting an integrated prom.
“We support the efforts of these ladies, and we praise their efforts to bring our students together,” Superintendent Steve Smith said in a statement published on the Wilcox County Schools website, according to CNN. “I am pleased to report that WCHS Principal Chad Davis has stated that his Leadership Team will place the 2014 Prom on its agenda for its next meeting.”
CNN reported that by Thursday, around 50 tickets were sold for the integrated prom. The teens hope to get around 100.
Earlier, Smith said he “consider[s] it an embarrassment to our schools and community that these events have portrayed us as bigoted in any way.”
