Dress controversy frustrates board

By Emily Richmond

Friday, Sept. 10, 2004 | 8:55 a.m.

It's a toss-up as to who was the most frustrated Thursday: the parents and students who came yet again to complain about the district's dress code policy or the Clark County School Board members fed up with rehashing the issue week after week.

"This has been an agenda item all summer," board member Shirley Barber said. "Let's hurry up and come to some agreement and put it away."

The School Board members agreed to arrange a work session to discuss the district's dress code policy, as well as the practice by some principals of adopting stricter rules for their own schools.

Called "Dress for Success" at some campuses and "standard school attire" at others, the regulations typically ban blue jeans and require students to wear solid-colored shirts and khaki-colored bottoms. There are variations between campuses, with some students allowed to choose T-shirts while others must don polo or oxford-style tops.

The School Board heard from nine people, including Liberty High School junior Kim Jacobs. As reported by the Sun, Kim was sent home from school Wednesday after she refused to switch her T-shirt bearing a religious message for a solid-color top from the campus' list of approved clothing. Liberty is one of more than two dozen schools across the district that have adopted dress code policies that are stricter than the district's regulations.

"I am an American and my rights have been taken away from me -- my right to go to school," Kim said.

Kim's father, Donald Jacobs, said he fully supports the district-wide dress code regulation, which bans items such as navel-baring shirts and baggy pants. But squelching students' freedom of expression and their First Amendment rights goes too far, Jacobs said.

"No one has been able to explain to me how my daughter is going to learn better in a shirt the school says she should be wearing than in the clothes that I, her father, say are acceptable," he said.

Dwight Terry Sr. told the School Board his son, a sophomore at Chaparral High School, had been yanked from his honors English class Wednesday because he was wearing black pants and a shirt with a stripe on it.

"It is my job to dress him," Terry said. "You are there for one reason -- to teach him."

Susan Jackson said she and her daughter -- an eighth grader at Sedway Middle School -- have been struggling with the "Dress for Success" policy since classes began last week. Her daughter has been singled out by school staff for wearing earrings, makeup and colored tights, Jackson said.

"She's a good girl, she never gets into trouble, her grades are excellent," Jackson said. "I've been trying to make her go along with what the school wants, but now, after hearing Mr. Jacobs, I think I've been doing the wrong thing. From now on she can wear what she wants."

Because the dress code was not on Thursday's agenda -- it came up during the public comment period, when no vote can be taken -- the board did not tell principals what to do until the work session can be held.

School Board member Sheila Moulton asked district staff to make sure members of the public are notified once the work session is scheduled. While Thursday's speakers during the public comment portion of the meeting were eloquent "we need to hear both sides," Moulton said.

School Board member Denise Brodsky said she was distressed that campuses had apparently implemented the new dress code requirements with little -- if any -- input from parents.

Many hours were spent crafting the framework for a pilot study that allows mandatory uniforms at a handful of elementary schools, Brodsky said. The pilot study requires families be surveyed ahead of time and a minimum of 70 percent show support, Brodsky said.

"There seem to be three different policies and, depending upon the will of the principal, that's what determines what policy that school is going to use," Brodsky said. "It's really a slap in the board's face."

Brodsky added that she is unconvinced by the argument that uniforms and stricter dress code policies improve campus safety by making trespassers more easily identifiable.