Were there any? If not, why not? I can't imagine a trip like that without adults making sure the kids stayed out of trouble. The adults also had an obligation to be sure the kids are safe. In this case the kids were the transgressors, but what if a kid gets lost, wanders off, gets hurt or mugged? Whichever adults were in charge of the trip were responsible for making sure the kids didn't either cause trouble or become the victim of someone or something else. A whole bunch of heads need to roll, and not just the kids'.

the chaperones had other things to do, much of the time.

On one overnight trip, for example, our chaperones were the Band Director and another teacher at the school. The rooms in the hotel for the band members were on one floor of the hotel. The chaperones had their rooms two floors up. As it turned out, the affair that was going on between the two adults was discovered somewhat later. We saw little of them on that trip, except at performances and meals.

To the student's benefit, of course, that opened up many possibilities. For example, two of the teen couples in the band arranged their hotel rooms so that the two guys and the two girls were roommates. Officially. After the lights went out, though, the roommates switched rooms, offering somewhat more privacy for the couples than they ordinarily had. Don't ask me how I know of that arrangement, though. I won't tell.

Such were the secrets of the Band Trip, generally. Still, we all behaved ourselves reasonably well when in public.

relating to a very controversial issue, where it's not unusual for people to get into heated arguments. Knowing that the circumstances were likely to be tense, and that teenagers are not very good at controlling themselves over even minor things, there should have been adult supervision.

I recall a choir trip in college where we went to New York City with the Minnesota Orchestra, and we got to sing in Carnegie Hall! But we also had a couple of free days where we could go to Broadway shows and see the sights. We were not chaperoned except with respect to hotel accommodations, and I distinctly recall wandering around Times Square (in a group, of course) late at night, fascinated by the porn film theaters, dirty bookstores and hookers (this was way back before Times Square became respectable). There were no chaperones in sight. IIRC, a few adults came along on the trip just to be sure we weren't doing the deed in our hotel rooms (but apparently they weren't paying attention to that, either...). However, we were college students, mostly juniors and seniors, and maybe slightly less in need of watching over.

there was a thread in my local paper today discussing the exact same thing. One of the usual MAGAts said, Weren't you ever a kid, once? Didn't you do stupid things? The replies he got were, generally, I many have done stupid things in my youth but I never stuck my face into another man's face who was my grandfather's age and disrespected him. It's unbelievable how some people defend these kids' actions. Sure doesn't say much for today's Catholic education, does it? Seems as though Catholic schools have simply become alternatives for the white elites so they don't have to send their kids to those evil public schools with the hoi polloi.

They did a mean, vicious, inexcusable and possibly criminal thing. Teenagers do stupid things because doing stupid things and paying the consequences is how you learn not to keep doing them. Most of the time they do stupid things knowing they're stupid, but they do them anyhow because they're fun or exciting. But by the time you're 16 or 17 you should know the difference between what's exciting but stupid, and what's mean and criminal. And if they don't know the difference, why the hell not?

antisocial political behavior. Or, at least, there used to be.

A group of the kids came back from Lincoln Memorial. . They told us that an older man there, a stranger, recited the Gettysburg Address by heart to all the visitors there. They were moved to tears, told us all about it. We were from Georgia. Granted, our group tilted left (model UN) but still ... it was a sacred memory.

We do live in a different world today.

percentage-wise. We just know about every last case of child-snatching, flashers, and perverts who bother children now than we did then. And we know about it from everywhere, rather than just from our own town or neighborhood.

movement was taking place. I think it created a sense that all children were in danger in the mind of the public. Today we have become a very fearful society to the point where parents can't let their children walk to school alone without legal repercussions.

incidents involving children. But, unless you lived in that town and read its weekly newspaper, you'd never have known about them. Such stories just did not get the kind of broad coverage they do today.

I had recall my niece went to the "March for Life" with her Catholic school, she had to wear the school uniform,

I pointed out to the Principal in my email;
The Students represented the School,
The Students represented Catholics,
The Students represented the "March for Life" movement.

They failed those three groups.

If I was one of those students, My father would say I failed him and our family, but since I don't know the families involve I didn't write that.

As of this morning I saw a few mentions defending the Boys and excuses for their behavior.
I have not seen any expressions of remorse or any type of apologies

and others, as well as the students involved. There will be repercussions, I'm certain. However, if you want to know about those, you'll probably have to follow the local media in that area. The national news won't do follow-up coverage.

I recommend doing Google News searches for "Covington Catholic High School" next week, if you're interested.

And nobody ever asked me to chaperone one these trips.

I never take any shit from the right wing Catholics in our community.

When I was a teen my mom was an anti-abortion activist. Her solution to the problem was to promote explicit sex education, including birth control, such that she became a pariah in various right-wing religious communities.

There were kids in our neighborhood who were banned from our house by their parents, who feared my mom would give their kids condoms, or drive them to Planned Parenthood for birth control prescriptions. Our house was also a safe place for LGBTQ kids.

I think there's been progress, at least here in Democratic California. Most I ever suffer is stink-eye from the right wingers.

It involved a 3 night overnight stay. It wasn't a traditional hotel, it was more set up as a dorm if I can remember right. Most hotels don't have twin beds (I honestly don't remember the bathroom situation).

I remember someone being sent home early due to misbehavior (this kid had a long history of it and was the class bully) but I don't remember his crime.

We had one (teacher) chaperone for every 8-10 students and a VERY packed schedule.

We weren't there long before all the chaperones took off to the bar except 4 of us who didn't drink.

Probably the high schoolers behaved themselves reasonably well, anyhow.

This is not excusing them, but they could probably care less about RTL.

If they were involved in a more age appropriate event, they probably wouldn't have gravitated to the African-Americans and Native-Americans.

That doesn't excuse them. And it doesn't mean they're not racist. Put the two together and you have a bad event.

thought a lot about reproductive choice, beyond hoping their girlfriends don't get pregnant. High school boys are not known for their careful consideration of such issues, in my experience.

For them, it was just an out of town trip, primarily, I'm sure.