Students suspended for having long hair in school?!
http://www.wfaa.com/sharedcontent/dws/wfaa/latestnews/stories/wfaa080108_lj_hair.13a48a8.html
At least four Kerens High School students were suspended Tuesday for three days after ignoring a mandate to cut their hair upon returning to school after Christmas break, according to one of the youths. Matthew Lopez-Widish said that after he and three other long-haired friends entered school Tuesday morning, the principal and assistant principal were waiting and called the students into their office. The students were handed suspension papers, and Matthew said Principal David Tyson told them, “We warned you, and you knew this was going to happen.”
“All I’m going to say is that we took action today,” Mr. Tyson told The Dallas Morning News. “It was basically a violation.” Mr. Tyson would not confirm the number of students suspended. “If the students get haircuts within the next three days, they will be allowed to return,” Matthew said. “I don’t plan on it,” said Matthew, whose hair hasn’t been cut in four years. “I’m not going to change.”
Another friend who was suspended, Andy Coronado, cut his hair during the break to come into compliance, but his hair still reached over his ears and was deemed unacceptable, Matthew said.
The controversy in Kerens, about 15 miles east of Corsicana, erupted a few days before Christmas break. The students were told that they must cut their hair or they’d face alternative schools, be removed from extracurricular activities and perhaps jeopardize graduation. Administrators said the new mandate stemmed from students repeatedly ignoring hair code policies.
The policy for male students at Kerens High says hair may not go past the collar, below the eyebrows or a half-inch over the ears. Ponytails can be no longer than a half-inch. If the students don’t comply within the next three days, a hearing will be set up to discuss alternative school.
“We are hoping that the situation will be rectified, and we don’t have to go that far,” Mr. Tyson said.
A straight-A senior, Matthew said he doesn’t want to attend alternative school and is willing to look into transferring.
The students still plan to take their cause to the next school board meeting on Monday.
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Two words…UTTER BULLSHIT!
The school systems waste time with what is worn, and hair and piercings and freedom of expression in the most basic manners, and this is what we get. We get administrations abusing authority that seek to impress their own individual consensus on values on other individuals. Students are not in schools to learn some antiquated lesson on conformity, they are there to grow as people. Depriving students of an education based on how they look is biased, prejudicial, and a complete antithesis to our freedom of expression. I sincerely hope this instigates litigation on behalf of those students being railroaded.
