Dress code
November 16, 2018
Dress code
When picking out what to wear to school each morning are you determining if it fits in the dress code or do you think, “wow I look good in this”. Will this outfit turn some heads or will I end up in the principal’s office? We gave out a survey to 112 randomly selected students here at Bishop Union High School about the dress code. The questions we asked were: Do you think the dress code is unfair? And have you ever been dress coded? 90 out of the 112 students said that they do believe the dress code is unfair and 22 believed it is fair.
Through our results, it is obvious that many students here at BUHS do not agree with the dress code. Many may think that only the girls here at BUHS have found it unfair, but many boys believe it too is not fair. Why should we change the dress code? Many students said “its sexist”, “it’s 2018, why does it matter what we wear” and “ why are girls shoulders a distraction”. Many also said that the dress code is unequal and some girls constantly get dress coded but many wearing the same clothes will not.
Students even said that the social status of a student effects if they are dress coded or not. A student wrote, “Only certain people are dress coded it depends on who you are and who you know.” Another student as well wrote about popularity saying, ”they play favorites and let others wear booty shorts.”
After talking to our vice principal Mr. Kalk, we discovered that the dress code here at BUHS actually gets adjusted every year to accommodate new fashions. Mr. Kalk said that parents should make administrations life’s better by making sure their kids are dressing appropriately and following the dress code rules. In Mr. Kalk’s point of view dress code isn’t the most important rule as long as the students are performing in their academics. He believes that students should know and dress appropriately but being the vice principal he is obligated to enforce the rules that are set. He, as well as other staff here at BUHS, especially the male staff, have said that dress code is hard for them to enforce because they don’t want it to come off as they are looking at the female students.
Is the dress code not being enforced because it can come back and look bad on the staff?
As we interviewed Mr. Kalk we asked about the idea of hiring someone whose main job would be enforcing the dress code and other school rules like the phone policy out of class, but it was refused as the school budget could not sustain it, and it’s not completely necessary.
From our survey, the number one complaint was the off the shoulder rule, and when it was brought up to Mr.Kalk he explained that there has to be a dress code and if he sees something he will say something. The school board has to determine how much skin they can allow being shown by students. Last year the Student Senate brought up to the School Board about how the dress code is unfair, but nothing has seemed to change. From the Survey, we found that students voices are not being heard but yet most think the dress code is unfair.
