Scott Hollifield: Do the hustle? Not so fast, kids

I don't boogie much.

Nor do I shake my tail feathers, groove thing or money maker with any degree of frequency. In that regard, I'm much like students who follow the rules at Union Grove High School in Wisconsin.

But when I do cut a rug, get down with my bad self or trip the light fantastic, I lift at least one foot off the floor. At Union Grove, that's a no-no.

While perusing The Smoking Gun Web site to see if my mug shot had been uploaded, I came across the document "Dance Policies and Procedures" for the Jan. 30 winter formal at Union Grove, where "boys should wear collared shirts and dress pants ... girls cannot wear dresses that expose cleavage" and the "Racine County Sheriffs will be called and ticket (at their discretion) any student found drinking at the dance."

Yes, it promised to be a proper and almost certainly sober affair.

In addition to explaining when the dance would begin and end and what would happen if you were indeed ticketed by the Racine County Sheriffs (three-day suspension), the policies and procedures document outlined in explicit detail what kind of dancing would be prohibited.

First, let me say the last school dance I attended was five years ago. The policies and procedures of that dance were something like this: "First-, second- and third-graders attending this dance must be accompanied by a parent. (And no, Mr. Hollifield, you cannot just drop your child off in front of the school with a $5 bill pinned to her shirt.) Parents will be required to sit for 90 minutes and watch children run around and scream like maniacs while strobe lights flash. (And no, Mr. Hollifield, you cannot leave early for 'an urgent newspaper-related emergency' and return when the dance is over.) Parents must listen to 'Who Let the Dogs Out?' until their ears bleed."

Administrators at Union Grove High School don't require parental attendance, but they do run a pretty tight ship when it comes to the dance floor.

The policy states "when dancing back to front, all dancers must remain upright" with no lascivious "bending."

"Examples are, no hands on knees, and no hands on the dance floor with your buttocks touching your dance partner." (I will admit I did the latter at the last Willie Nelson show I went to, but only because I dropped a dollar on the floor just as Willie tore into "Whiskey River" and the woman behind me tried to move closer to the stage.)

The policy continued in detail about what people could not touch while dancing, and because this is a family publication I will paraphrase by saying no one could touch here, or behind there, or to the left or right of that, and anyone caught touching there would be ticketed by the Racine County Sheriffs.

While I agree with most of Union Grove's dance policies, this one seemed a bit unreasonable: "Both feet must remain on the dance floor at all times."

Automatically, this rules out a conga line and the can-can. What if the DJ goes old school and breaks out Van Halen's 1984 hit "Jump?" What are the kids going to do, "go ahead and stand there?"

As a test, I tried to cut a rug while keeping both feet on the floor. The rug bunched up, I fell over, and "Whiskey River" skipped on the CD player. I tried to get down with my bad self. Myself was far from bad. I attempted to trip the light fantastic. The light fantastic remained untripped.

Union Grove administrators, I call on you to change your policy and let students lift one or even both feet off the floor during future dances. If not, you should call them shuffles instead.