The high school in My So-Called Life is based on the Pittsburgh Suburban community of Upper St. Claire.
At the end of the episode, the teacher asks the students to turn to page 27. This episode deals with death and loss. Kurt Cobain died at the age of 27 months earlier. While Rayanne and Angela are talking in the library, there's a guy dressed as Jimi Hendrix perusing a shelf in the background. He is also a part of the "27 Club" phenomenon that consists of musicians (and arguably actors) dying at age 27. (Usually involving drugs and/or suicide.)
Although this episode takes place in October for Halloween, the June edition of Rolling Stone magazine with Kurt Cobain on the cover is featured twice in this episode. He died earlier that April.
Nicky Driscoll is named for Bobby Driscoll, who famously voiced the title character in Disney's Peter Pan (1953). Peter Pan is known as The Boy Who Wouldn't Grow Up, and is himself a reference to the early death of the author's older brother.