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Is dress coding about 'safety' or is it something more sinister?
By Alexandra Blogier — Written on Apr 05, 2023
The mom of a 12-year-old girl found herself fighting the system after her daughter received multiple internal suspensions at school because her pants were deemed “too tight.”
In November 2015, Traci Hull received an email from her daughter’s school, stating that the 12-year old had violated the school’s dress code. As per the rules, Morgan Hull was taken out of class and given an internal suspension by school supervisors.
Her dress code crime? Wearing a pair of dark blue skinny jeans. According to the school’s email, Morgan should have just received a warning that she’d violated the dress code, yet she was given an in-school suspension, instead.
The next day, Morgan wore a different pair of pants to school — and she was once again suspended for violating the dress code.
Traci decided she’d had enough. She met with the assistant principal of the Franklin Township middle school to advocate for her daughter. Yet the assistant principal aligned themselves with the dress code, and not their students, reiterating that Morgan’s pants were too tight. Once again, Morgan was not allowed to attend class.
"She is completely covered," Hull explained to RTV6 news. "There's no cleavage or anything exposed."
It shouldn’t matter if a student is showing cleavage, or not — the focus of school should be providing kids with a comprehensive education, and not policing their outfits. Adhering to strict dress code rules reinforces the idea that girls’ bodies aren’t their own to control, and that the existence of the male gaze takes precedence over a girl’s right to merely exist.
The school's emphasis on the dress code shows where their values lie — outward appearance over the education students deserve.
As Traci stated to RTV6, “She is behind in school and we are spending now two days focused on pants that are too tight. It is unfathomable to me that there is this big of an issue on her dress code and not her education.”
According to Traci, Morgan had been wearing the pair of “too-tight” pants since the start of the school year, and it was only in November that she was told they were a dress code violation.
While Traci agreed to find other clothes for her daughter to wear, she noted that Morgan “is extremely petite, so trying to find clothes that fit her is difficult. It’s dumbfounding, I just don’t get it.”
Traci tried to arrange a meeting with the superintendent of the school district, yet she was denied access. However, the school superintendent, Dr. Flora Reichanadter, released a statement to RTV6, in which she claimed to believe in “maintaining a safe and orderly school environment.”
Reichanadter reported that Franklin Township was a “high-performing school district,” yet it seems school officials are more concerned with what female students wear than how they perform in class. Reichanadter’s statement continued, outlining support for the dress code.
“There are and will be times in which some styles of clothing are not appropriate or conducive to the school environment and should be kept as an option outside of school.”
Yet it’s hard to see how a pair of jeans aren’t conducive to learning, especially when the jeans in question had no holes and covered Morgan’s legs completely.
“Our school handbook is very specific regarding the dress code for middle school students,” Reichanadter stated. An office employee allegedly reviewed Morgan’s offending outfit and deemed it appropriate for school. That employee confirmed that Morgan’s multiple dress code violations would be investigated further.
It’s unclear how enforcing the dress code kept the school environment “safe and orderly” for its students. In reality, the school’s strict adherence to the dress code disrupted a student’s learning for multiple days in a row.
The fact that a school’s time and resources are being spent on what students wear and not what they’re learning feels especially archaic in our current climate, especially as teachers struggle with supply shortages, low pay, and literally putting their lives on the line for their students.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango's news and entertainment team. She covers celebrity gossip, pop culture analysis and all things to do with the entertainment industry.