School Climate & Safety

Students Push Schools to Overhaul Dress Codes: Their Success Stories and Lessons Learned

By Eesha Pendharkar — March 31, 2023 6 min read
Composite of 3 individuals, two looking at the camera and from behind playing the piano.
  • Save to favorites
  • Print

School dress codes have disproportionately targeted girls, students of color, and LGBTQ+ students for years, according to research. But what happens when those students fight back?

Marginalized students have been known to get called out for not abiding by school dress codes for years, because of the way most dress codes are written, research has shown. Sometimes, it’s because their hair, bodies, and clothing are considered distracting or inappropriate, according to the dress code. Other times, it’s because of the enforcement mechanism the district chooses.

Dress codes are often embedded in student codes of conduct, or are written as policies meant to provide guidelines on what students can and can’t wear, including specific pieces of clothing, hairstyles, and accessories. Dress codes can vary widely in what they restrict. Ninety-three percent of students have dress codes in their districts, according to a Government Accountability Office report last year.

But that report, which studied school dress codes from 236 districts, found stark discrepanciesin not only the apparel, hairstyles, and accessories that dress codes ban, but how they are enforced. It also found anecdotal examples and data of Black students, LGBTQ+ students, and girls being disproportionately targeted.

“We have been most concerned about dress codes that target Black girls and girls of color because what we know from our experiences working with students—but also from data that’s out there—is that oftentimes these dress codes will be disproportionately enforced against girls of color based on intersecting race and gender stereotypes,” said Linda Morris, a lawyer for the ACLU’s Women’s Rights Project who has been involved in keeping districts accountable for dress codes across the country.

(Morris was involved in three dress code cases from Florida, New York, and Texas which Education Week profiled.)

Dress codes often require that clothing worn by girls not be too revealing or distracting, banning “halter or strapless tops,” “skirts or shorts shorter than mid-thigh,” and “yoga pants or any type of skin tight attire,” the GAO report says.

Many of those policies prohibit clothing that exposes a student’s midriff. About a quarter of them specifically bar the exposure of “cleavage,” “breasts,” or “nipples,” which are aimed at female students.

Because dress codes are gendered, they often are also discriminatory towards gender non-conforming, nonbinary, and transgender students.

Figuring out exactly how dress codes impact students is challenging, the report found, because how districts enforce them varies widely, and there is a lack of national or even state-level data about the consequences of violating dress codes.

While dress code violations do not often result directly in exclusionary discipline such as suspensions and expulsions, an estimated 44 percent of dress codes outlined “informal” removal policies, such as taking a student out of class without documenting it as a suspension, the study found.

That means while school dress codes are written and enforced unfairly to target certain groups of students more than others, the consequences of violating dress codes can vary widely from lost classroom time to suspensions.

In some cases, students have faced harsh discipline for dress code violations, such as being removed from school and sent to an alternative education program, being sent to in-school suspension for weeks, or being banned from extracurriculars and athletics.

However, in some cases, students impacted by dress codes and their families have fought against district policies.

That pushback came at a personal cost—some students were suspended, some lost classroom time, and others were banned from state-level athletic competitions.

Here are stories from three districts that successfully changed their district dress codes, what it took to make those changes, and what happened in the aftermath:

In Florida: High School Students Challenge Dress Code After Girls’ Photos Were Censored

Riley O’Keefe found her freshman yearbook at Bartram Trail High School in St. Johns, Florida altered with a digital black bar to hide her chest. The school later printed yearbooks without alterations.

When Riley O’Keefe, a freshman at Bartram Trail High School in St. Johns, Florida got her yearbook for the 2020-21 school year, she flipped to her page to find that a black box had been added over her chest.

She was shocked. As she leafed through the pages, she found almost 80 girls’ photos had been altered similarly. Some had black boxes added to cover their shoulders as well. She did not find any boys’ photos altered.

“Obviously, that’s embarrassing, right? Your photo was altered and looks crazy in the yearbook,” she said.

“A lot of guys were making comments about the way our chests looked in the picture. And some were even writing in girls’ yearbooks about it.”

On the day she got the yearbook, Riley happened to be wearing the same black bodysuit from the censored photo, she went to the front office and asked if her shirt was acceptable under the dress code, but the office staff couldn’t give her a definitive answer, she said.

So she went to her vice principal to ask the same question.

Continue reading →

In New York: How Athletes Suspended for Wearing Sports Bras to Practice Changed the Dress Code

Albany High School track team members pose after being kicked out their practice and a lacrosse game the same day for wearing sports bras on an 80-degree day.

Last May, with temperatures hitting more than 80 degrees, Kayla Huba and her track team showed up to practice at Albany High School in New York in sports bras.

The boys’ team also had their shirts off, Huba said. But the athletic director, Alice Chapple, stopped the practice and warned the girls that their attire was inappropriate and a distraction to their male coaches, according to Huba.

The next day, the team showed up dressed the same way again, because it was even hotter, Huba said. This time, Chapple kicked them out of practice for violating the dress code. She also told one of the boys practicing to put his shirt back on, Huba said, but didn’t kick any of them out.

Later that day, Huba—now 19—and other team members tried to attend a lacrosse game in the same outfits, but security guards and Chapple stopped them.

“I don’t know her personal reasoning, but I feel like maybe it’s just society has kind of put it into everyone’s brains that women’s bodies are sexual, like we’re overly sexualized,” Huba, who was a senior at the time, said.

“But guys having their shirts off is not an issue.”

Continue reading →

In Texas: Nonbinary Child’s Long Hair Results in Suspension, Dress Code Amended After Legal Battle

Tristan, the 11-year-old child of Danielle Miller who identifies as nonbinary, was sent to in-school suspension for having long hair at Magnolia ISD.

On the second day of middle school at Magnolia ISD in Texas, in September 2021, Danielle Miller got a phone call from her kid’s principal, asking her to cut Tristan’s shoulder-length hair.

At the time, Tristan identified as nonbinary. Now, they use he/they pronouns interchangeably. Cutting their hair meant losing a key part of their identity, they told Miller. Besides, they had had long hair for years and never received a warning or reprimand for it, Miller said.

“When I told Tristan that they were going to have to cut their hair because it was out of dress code, I was met with just absolute devastation and heartbreak,” she said. “And it wasn’t because it was a kid being told they had to do something they wouldn’t want to do, it’s because Tristan was able to identify as nonbinary based on being able to present themselves as feminine with long hair.”

According to the district’s dress code at the time, Tristan, then 11, was not supposed to have long hair because they were assigned male at birth. Miller explained to their principal over the phone that their hair was part of Tristan’s identity, but was told that they would have to go to in-school suspension if they didn’t do it.

“I explained to the principal, Tristan’s identification and just how Tristan likes to present themselves. And I said, ‘what would you do if you had a child that was like this?’ And she said, ’I would cut his hair,’ and hung up the phone,” Miller said.

Continue reading →

Events

Budget & Finance Webinar Leverage New Funding Sources with Data-Informed Practices
Address the whole child using data-informed practices, gain valuable insights, and learn strategies that can benefit your district.
This content is provided by our sponsor. It is not written by and does not necessarily reflect the views of Education Week's editorial staff.
Sponsor
Classroom Technology Webinar
ChatGPT & Education: 8 Ways AI Improves Student Outcomes
Revolutionize student success! Don't miss our expert-led webinar demonstrating practical ways AI tools will elevate learning experiences.
Content provided by Inzata
Classroom Technology K-12 Essentials Forum Tech Is Everywhere. But Is It Making Schools Better?
Join us for a lively discussion about the ways that technology is being used to improve schools and how it is falling short.

EdWeek Top School Jobs

Teacher Jobs
Search over ten thousand teaching jobs nationwide — elementary, middle, high school and more.
View Jobs
Principal Jobs
Find hundreds of jobs for principals, assistant principals, and other school leadership roles.
View Jobs
Administrator Jobs
Over a thousand district-level jobs: superintendents, directors, more.
View Jobs
Support Staff Jobs
Search thousands of jobs, from paraprofessionals to counselors and more.
View Jobs

Read Next

School Climate & Safety Superintendent 'Devastated' by Deadly, Post-Graduation Shooting
Violence disrupts a cherished rite of passage.
3 min read
Flowers are placed in front of the Altria Theater which was the site of a mass shooting after a graduation ceremony, June 7, 2023, in Richmond, Va.
Flowers are placed in front of the Altria Theater which was the site of a mass shooting after a graduation ceremony, June 7, 2023, in Richmond, Va.
Steve Helber/AP
School Climate & Safety What Teachers Think About Carrying Guns at School, in Charts
Despite periodic pushes to outfit teachers with firearms, more than half of educators think doing so would make schools less safe.
3 min read
Watercolor image of a gun and bullets.
LuisPortugal/iStock/Getty
School Climate & Safety Opinion 5 Critical Strategies to Make Your School Safer
There's no single solution to defend students’ physical, mental, and emotional health, but these five actionable steps are a place to start.
Doug Roberts, Ann Levett & Shanna Downs
5 min read
Illustration of a group of people forming the shape of a shield around a school building.
iStock + E+/Getty Images +Education Week
School Climate & Safety Teachers Agree on Most School Safety Issues, Except Guns
Teachers agree on their schools' top safety concerns, but they're divided over a policy that's extensively debated after school shootings.
4 min read
Teachers and other staff members from the Clifton, Texas, school district undergo handgun training at a shooting range just outside of Clifton. Instructors from Big Iron Concealed Handgun Training in Waco, Texas, were giving teachers tips on what they need to know to earn a license to carry weapons out of sight.
Teachers and other staff members from the Clifton, Texas, school district undergo handgun training at a shooting range just outside of Clifton in 2013. Instructors from Big Iron Concealed Handgun Training in Waco, Texas, were giving teachers tips on what they need to know to earn a license to carry weapons out of sight.
Lance Rosenfield/Prime for Education Week