Wednesday, June 6, 2001

We are a group of middle school teachers who feel strongly that the letter from Ms. Greer about the dress code needs to be addressed. Parents need to realize the concerns we have toward the clothing choices a few of our students make. As parents ourselves, we have shopped for girls and boys for many years, and we know, for a fact, that proper attire is available at all of the stores mentioned in her letter. Every day, approximately 95 percent of our students are dressed appropriately. Where do those students buy their clothes if no stores offer them? In every juniors department there are plenty of items, such as t-shirts, shorts, jeans, and dresses that are fine at school. The problem might be a lack of parental advice or knowledge of what the kids are buying and wearing. We know that many of our students dress and leave after the parents have left the house. Some of these girls come to school dressed like they want to be Britney Spears, or some other scantily dressed star of the day so that she can get the attention from boys and others to that extreme. The girls who come to school dressed like they are ready for the beach with very short shorts (some barely covering their bottoms), tank tops, skin tight clothing etc., do get attention, especially from the boys in our classes. Parents complain of sexual harassment against their daughters, but they send these same girls to school dressed like they were ready to walk the streets of downtown Atlanta! It's no wonder that the boys make inappropriate remarks and may even touch girls with less than honorable intentions! The signals being sent by the girls are often misjudged by the young men, due to the clothing they are wearing . This is not right or fair, but it is the way things happen. Then the school is blamed for having too loose a discipline code for its students. There needs to be some common sense used when parents shop and permit their children to dress for school!

Teachers have many more important tasks to do every day and we would love not having to be the "Fashion Police!" Until we have uniforms, that even Ms. Greer mentioned as a good idea, teachers have the job and obligation to enforce the guidelines given us by the Fayette County Board of Education. Parents need to check with the handbook that the students get to see exactly what the dress code is, and they need to support our efforts to enforce it. For example, we know that the guideline for girls' shorts and tops is not what Ms. Greer said, there is no mention of "finger width" for shirts, it says that shirts need to cover "to the shoulder." Assuming parents will join with us, instead of being against us, students will not have to worry about being stopped at school and questioned about their clothing. It's time that parents in Fayette County teach their children respect for authority, and how to follow rules, etc., too many of these same children will be in trouble later in life for not learning this now.

Today is the last day of school, and we would like to tell the readers of some of the ways our students came dressed: shorts on girls where their back cheeks were exposed, tank tops with little or no underclothing, hair dyed brilliant colors and spiked to the sky, holes in clothes exposing much skin, and more! For next year, we would like parents to invest a little time and effort into helping us to resolve this problem.

Thank you,

Fayette County teachers

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