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Teresa Watanabe

GINA FERAZZI/Los Angeles Times
Alex Hom (right) found a unique way to ask Brooke Drury to the upcoming winter formal at South Pasadena High School. He gathered more than 20 friends to create a flash mob dance with roses and signs. Teens are using creative ways to ask dates to formals, proms and other high school dances.

Elevating the art of the invitation

Last updated Sunday, January 29, 2012 - 8:30am

LOS ANGELES -- For weeks, South Pasadena High School senior Alex Hom knew he wanted to ask freshman Brooke Drury to winter formal. But it wouldn't do to just pop the question -- too boring -- or, even worse, to text it.

So he rounded up more than 20 friends, supplied them with red roses, choreographed a dance routine and wrote out his plea on signs. Then he had a friend bring Brooke, blindfolded, to a spot on campus for the big production.

"I thought, this is my senior year and I gotta go out with a bang," Alex said.

He's not the only student elevating the art of the school dance invitation.

Students are folding the question into homemade fortune cookies, tucking it into pinatas, knitting it into scarves, spelling it out with pepperoni on pizza and orange chicken on fried rice.

Features, Dating, High school, Prom Read more Comments

Healthful school lunch menu panned by students

Teresa Watanabe Los Angeles Times

Last updated Thursday, December 22, 2011 - 12:39pm

LOS ANGELES -- It's lunchtime at Van Nuys High School and students stream into the cafeteria to check out the day's fare: black bean burgers, tostada salad, fresh pears and other items on a new healthful menu introduced this year by the Los Angeles Unified School District.

But Iraides Renteria and Mayra Gutierrez don't even bother to line up. Renteria said the school food previously made her throw up, and Gutierrez calls it "nasty, rotty stuff." So what do they eat? The juniors pull three bags of Flamin' Hot Cheetos and soda from their backpacks.

"This is our daily lunch," Iraides says. "We're eating more junk food now than last year."

For many students, L.A. Unified's trailblazing introduction of healthful school lunches has been a flop. Earlier this year, the district got rid of chocolate and strawberry milk, chicken nuggets, corn dogs, nachos and other food high in fat, sugar and sodium. Instead, district chefs concocted such healthful alternatives as vegetarian curries and tamales, quinoa salads and pad thai noodles.

Schools, Features, Healthy eating, Healthy foods, School lunches, Students Read more Comments