Parents vent their feelings on dress codes

By Emily Richmond (contact)

Friday, Oct. 8, 2004 | 9:57 a.m.

Parents gave Clark County School District officials an earful of suggestions, criticism and even the occasional compliment Thursday about a controversial dress code policy that is up for review.

"If you want your kids to wear uniforms, send them to private school," said Deanna Wright, whose two sons have both attended district schools with mandatory uniform policies. "This is a public school district -- it's a democracy and not a dictatorship."

The School Board will hold a work session Oct. 14 to discuss the regulation that governs student attire. At issue is whether individual schools should be allowed to set policies more strict than the general, district-wide regulation which bans such items as low-waist pants, baseball caps and spaghetti-strapped shirts.

Currently 27 schools in four of the district's five regions have instituted stricter dress code policies. Nine elementary schools surveyed families prior to joining a pilot study of mandatory uniforms. The remaining schools implemented the tougher dress codes -- which include limiting clothing options by fabric, color and style -- without first demonstrating community support.

District staff has recommended schools survey parents and show at least "50 percent plus one" of the families favor a stricter dress code. Several people at Thursday's meeting -- including Nevada ACLU executive director Gary Peck -- said that threshold is too low.

Several members of the School Board have said they would like to see at least 70 percent of families show support for stricter dress codes before the policies are put into place, Peck said.

"Now all you're asking for is, at best, a threadbare majority," Peck said.

Some School Board members have said while the policy is hammered out they did not want students to be kept from class because of failure to comply with the stricter dress code. But Dwight Terry Sr. said his son continues to be sent to the dean's office, missing out on his Advanced Placement and honors classes.

"You have created a monster you cannot control," Terry said. "It is my job to dress my kid -- nobody else's."

The audience, which included about 30 parents invited by the district to participate, appeared evenly divided between those in favor of stricter dress codes and those opposed. At several points the discussion grew heated and threatened to disintegrate into a yelling match, forcing Deputy Superintendent Agustin Orci to remind the audience of the purpose of the meeting.

"We're here to gather your suggestions and recommendations for the regulation and compile them for the School Board," Orci said. "We are not here to debate."

Joanne Scott, the mother of a son and daughter in middle school, provided a moment of levity as she explained why for years she has required her children to follow her own "uniform" policy of navy bottoms and solid-color shirts.

"I leave for work at 4:45 a.m.," said Scott, who works for Continental Airlines. "My husband gets the kids dressed in the morning. You can't imagine the combinations that man has come up with. There were days I would come home and say, 'Please tell me you didn't send our children to school looking like that.' "

Ron Winkel said he was "shocked" last year when he learned his daughters would be required to wear khaki-colored bottoms and red, white or blue shirts at students at the then-brand new Liberty High School. But a year later Winkel said he's changed his mind.

"I'm 100 percent behind the policy," Winkel said. "It's created a more positive learning environment."

Beverly Jacobs, whose granddaughter has been suspended for 15 days from Liberty for refusing to swap her religious-themed T-shirts for approved attire, said the proposed policy still gives principals too much leeway. The survey process needs to be spelled out more clearly, Jacobs said.

"There are a lot of I's un-dotted and T's un-crossed," Jacobs said.

The proposed regulation would allow schools already following the stricter policies to continue doing so through June. Campuses would have to survey families in order to continue the policy for the 2005-06 academic years.

Currently 27 campuses are following dress code policies that are more strict than the district's general regulations, which ban such items as low-waist pants and spaghetti-strapped shirts. There are nine elementary schools in the district's southeast region participating in a pilot study of mandatory uniforms. Those schools had to survey parents prior to joining the study.

Under the proposed regulation schools could avoid the survey process entirely by giving students an "opt out" clause based on religious, philosophical or financial reasons. But some parents said families should have to be "humiliated" by proving their reason for opposing the policy.

Schools currently enforcing stricter dress code policies would be allowed to continue through June but would have to survey parents before continuing the policy for the 2005-06 academic year.