Celebrating a COVID-friendly Halloween

by Sonya Rashkovan

This year, Halloween is on a Saturday, there will be a full moon, and daylight savings gives everyone an extra hour. It’s the perfect recipe for a fun-filled spooky night with friends, with no school the next day to prevent late night trick or treating or a movie marathon, but unfortunately the COVID-19 pandemic has canceled all plans. Montgomery County officials advised against traditional door-to-door trick-or-treating because of the “challenge of maintaining proper physical distancing on porches and at front doors.” 

Later, after the message was conveyed as “Halloween being canceled,” officials came out with another press release offering guidance to keep children and families safe during Halloween, and they stressed the importance of wearing masks to ensure the safety of our community. 

Even though the morale is down among children, a few students have shared that the pandemic doesn’t have to ruin the fun. For many, Halloween is about spending time with friends, feeling the spooky spirit, eating a lot of candy, and giving back to their community. These things don’t have to go just because of the pandemic! 

It’s been hard to keep in touch with friends and distant relatives throughout the pandemic. If you haven’t had the motivation to meet/Zoom with your friends, Halloween can be a great incentive to do so. Sam Lev, a sophomore at BCC, advises to “just hang out outside: have a fire or something.” Gave Moss, a student at Sandy Spring Friends School, corroborates, saying “people are doing backyard camping because it's a Friday, so it can be overnight and outside.” Having people over, even if they have been quarantining, might be uncomfortable for many people, so Peggy Yamoah, a Blake HS student, along with many other students has advised having a drive-in movie night. People get a chance to see their friends, but at the same time maintain social distance from cars, and delight in a night of fright together while watching Halloween movies. If your friends are far away or cannot meet with you under any circumstances, Michelle Wong, a sophomore at Richard Montgomery High School, is planning a virtual Thanksgiving instead of replicating Halloween. Her plans include having a festive meal and potentially a Netflix party over zoom. Even if it might be harder to connect with friends this Halloween season, it's not impossible to plan a safe and cautious event. Students added that still celebrating traditions with enough precaution can be great for your mental health, whether your celebration is in your backyard, in your car, or over Zoom.  

Another fall favorite for many families is Halloween house decorations, which, depending on how dedicated you are, can be quite exquisite and scary. Caroline Snedeker, a sophomore at Whitman, says that decorating her house is the most important part of Halloween. Other Bethesda students shared that neighbors who weren't giving out candy this year decided to still contribute to the Halloween spirit with massive decorations. Schools have also been trying to keep the school spirit up during this season. Whitman and Rockville High School SGAs have set up pumpkin carving contests to give prizes for the best carved or painted pumpkins. If you or you friends are planning to do something like this, make sure to do it in an eco-friendly way! Other Montgomery County high schools have set up digital spirit weeks to make students and staff feel connected even over Zoom. 

Unfortunately, MoCo officials advise against trick-or-treating in the traditional sense. One way to adapt trick-or-treating is to put baskets or individual bagged servings with candy outside of their houses around the neighborhoods. This way, kids can still walk around and get candy without interacting with house residents. Some streets have planned step-by-step navigation around their homes with arrows to show where to go, how to practice social distancing, and safely get candy. DC Party Box, a local entertainment company, is bringing a drive-thru trick or treating event to Rockville. Whitman student government has set up a Halloween “booing”. Even if there is no chance to get out to the streets for trick-or-treating, Sofiia, a Canadian student, advises fellow teens to buy candy and “eat it all by yourself” at home. Another unique idea is to support local businesses and bakeries by buying Halloween treats from them, substituting the manufactured sweets for warm baked goods.

Lastly, on the note of helping the local community, Halloween is a great time to give back to people in need, especially during the pandemic, when the lives of so many have been distraught. Here are a couple of initiatives that give back during this Halloween season: 

• Walter Johnson Student Government has planned a fundraiser to order fall themes goodie bags to send them to your friends and support the student government.

•  Felipe DeBolle, a junior at Walt Whitman, with his club Ayuda para Cambiar is hosting a covid-safe scavenger hunt in Glen Mar Park and Burning Tree on October 30th and 31st... He explains that “you’d need to pay to get in, and all the money we get will go to Help Educate, an organization operating in Guatemala that helps poor students with scholarships.” You can follow @ayudarparacambiar on Instagram for more details!! They set up strict protocols to ensure safety for everyone, “We would have people going around to make sure masks are being worn, and social distance is being kept, the scavenger hunt stations will have QR codes so that people don’t crowd there, the final prizes are pre-packaged to specific people so that there’s no hands-on interaction. They will also have Clorox wipes and hand sanitizer at the start and end and possibly at each station depending on how we do it!”

• Walt Whitman HS Young Focus Club is doing Ghosting for Greater Education; all you have to do is spend $4 or more to their Venmo and get Halloween Grams to fight poverty with education.  

• The long-lasting Kids-Helping-Kids tradition Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF goes virtual this year. All kids need to get started is sign up for the virtual box, and with donations from $20, which allows purchasing 100 bars of soap, to $185, which buys school supplies for 40 children. 

Besides COVID-19 altering our plans for Halloween, many things stay the same, like costumes that, for some, are the best part of Halloween. Unfortunately, Halloween costumes can be intentionally or unintentionally culturally insensitive, so before choosing you costume make sure to double check that your costume won’t appropriate someone’s culture. Historian, educator & author Blair Imani provided helpful resources to check your costumes! Another student-led organization, Diversify Your Narrative, set up comprehensive infographics on Halloween cultural appropriation and later provided information on harms of blackfishing or other insensitive practices that could potentially come up in the Halloween costumes. 

Whether this year will be celebrating old traditions or trying something new, it’s really up to you to decide how you spend this holiday. Make sure you’re keeping yourself and your community safe from Covid-19-- wear a mask, wash your hands,  have fun and be SAFE!