CUSD students protest for gender neutral code

For several weeks, a legal fight has taken place within the Fresno County pertaining to the dress code conducted in the Clovis Unified School District. Acts of protest from students at Buchanan, as well as throughout Clovis, demand for change regarding its controversial, decades-old dress code.

According to Clovis dress code, skirts or dresses, earrings and long hair are forbidden amongst male students. Across the county, students have protested by dressing in clothing of the opposite gender. Students claim that the dress code hinders the creativity and expression of students. Clothes are simply the outer layer, but they aren’t necessarily gender-exclusive, students argue.

A senior at Buchanan High School, Wyatt Browning, shares that dress code restrictions go beyond just professionalism but inhibit creativity within a student.

“I think this goes beyond worrying about appearing professional, and into the realm of personal preference,” Browning said. “There are countless professionals with facial hair, and many with long hair, as well. Some of the top companies, like Google and Apple, have no dress code, and allow employees to dress and groom themselves as they please, because this leads to a higher morale, which leads to increased productivity. However, many students aren’t even worried about gender equality, but rather just want to grow out their hair.”

On Jan. 27, 2016, Clovis Unified trustees voted 4-3 against updating the policy. Since the vote, trustees have denied education to students through its unlawful dress code. A letter from the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) to the Clovis Board in August of 2015 acknowledges an agreement between the two that revisions would be made by the second semester.

Junior at Clovis North, Madison Devereaux, believes that the dress code sets a standard for greatness in terms of preparing high school students to be adults.

“The dress code hasn’t interfered with my style and I don’t really mind the dress code,” Devereaux said. “I think that it is a respectable dress code because it it teaching us how we should dress in the real world. Having a strict dress code is manageable, although I can see how for some people it is perceived as unfair.”

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The Clovis board refuses to to make changes to the dress code to make it gender neutral. The dress code was created in 1975, and despite the state laws and recommendations, the district has fought to keep the dress code the same. In previous years, a similar controversy also took place over the same issue. In 1994, students filed a lawsuit concerning a similar issue, and, again, the district won.

Some parents complain, saying that Clovis dress code stresses students and takes focus off of school work. While several students have been caught out of dress code, their time out of class ticks as they are forced to change clothes. Other parents disagree with the students and say that the dress code should stay, arguing that it is directly tied to the district’s success in other areas.

Last summer, a senior at Buchanan, William Pleasant, was denied enrollment due to his length of his hair, which reached past his earlobes. Pleasant has received multiple detentions and was sent to Saturday school (a four hour detention) due to breaking dress code with his hair. He was even threatened to not be allowed to take his end-of-the-year finals during his junior year.

Pleasant states that the district has achieved excellence but still lacks fervor in changing its dress code.

“CUSD, a district that has time and time again shown its commitment to excellence, would maintain a dress code policy that forces students to conform to an outdated model for dress while hindering creativity and denying personal expression at the detriment to students is perplexing to say the least,” Pleasant said. “If people at the district would venture as far as to take survey of student’s approval of the dress code, the results would quantify the discontent student feel towards the dress code.”

At the beginning of senior year he was denied enrollment. During that time he decided to reach out to the ACLU. After the treatment he received due to his hair, the wrote a Letter to the Editor to the Fresno Bee about the dress code.

Recently, the Clovis board decided to reconsider its vote on its strict dress code due to the conflict with the state law protecting gender expression, so the discussion continues. 

This writer can be reached via Twitter: @jennypenny8835 and via Email: Jenny King.

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