Day in and day out, we hear about school communities who struggle to drum up the necessary support from students' parents to achieve their goals, be they academic, financial or extracurricular. Who, in this day and age, would then consider it wise to put significant restrictions on the parents who step up for their children? The answer, apparently, is Principal Carlotta Outley Brown, Houston high school principal who crafted a dress code for parents, declaring it “necessary to establish high standards for students.” The move expressly prohibits anyone wearing hair rollers, pajama pants, torn jeans, sagging pants or shower caps and bonnets — a covering that many Black women use to protect their hair during hours-long treatment processes — from picking up their children or meeting with school officials, even in emergency situations. In addition, wearing leggings, revealing shirts, short skirts and anything otherwise appearing to be even marginally suggestive will result in a parent being barred from the premises until they are in accordance with the new dress code. “We are preparing our children for the future and it begins here,” wrote Brown in a letter addressed to parents. “We want them to know what is appropriate and what is not appropriate for any setting they may be in.” Not only does this disrespect the parents and their desire to advocate for their community and their children, but it also weakens the strength of whatever community does desire to come together around these children. As Brown rightly acknowledges, a child’s parents are always their first teachers. But we must acknowledge that children benefit from being protected and guided by the largest village possible — and undermining that by discouraging parents from showing up because they aren’t dressed according to an antiquated view of what “respectable” looks like only reduces the variety of positive influences that can change a child’s future. It also demeans the voices and contributions of the parents who are there, implying that they can only be seen as valuable if they dress a certain way. The policy also blatantly targets women: Demanding that they be covered up in order to access their own children reads explicitly like a principal trying to mold a community to her own sensibilities, instead of trying to teach children to be thoughtful about how to show up in the world and how to treat those who show up differently than they do. In a social climate in which women who dress across a spectrum of appropriateness — from conservatively to scantily clad — face a still-untold amount of sexual harassment and hurdles to professional advancement, the desire to cover up every semblance of a woman’s body so that they can care for their children is wrong. Furthermore, when we consider how those who are not of the suburban persuasion are constantly mistreated, maligned and devalued, we do ourselves and our children a disservice by encouraging kids to perpetuate this harmful behavior. The lesson they learn should not be that those who show up different from our expectations should be turned away; the lesson should be that they deserve equal, fair and empathetic treatment in every way. Instead of trying to be the public servant who encourages people to come as they are, utilizing every parent to help her build an empowering community with the limited resources so many schools have, Brown has opted to create barriers that limit the kind of volunteering that parents can do. Contrast Madison High's exclusionary focus with the procedures in place at LeBron James’ I Promise School in Akron, Ohio. A public school that explicitly sought out the students who needed the most support, the I Promise school embraces the belief that “We are Family” — a nod to a classic Sister Sledge song — in word and deed, both with its students and their families. “It took me coming here to realize what family even is,” stated one of the school’s parents, after acknowledging how unsupported she’d previously been in schools as a single parent. “When I come here every day, I know it’s going to be OK.” School administrators have the ability to foster unparalleled forms of community around our most precious resource: Our children. Public schools need advocacy that can only come when we all band together and learn how to fight and who to fight in a way that speaks to our individual communities, regardless of attire. The effectiveness of that community is squandered when we pretend the thing that limits a community’s access to success is something as meaningless as clothing. When we put limitations on how parents are allowed to show up for children, we not only diminish the potential of our parent community, we also blatantly disrespect the parents who come — when they can, however they can — to support the school and its intended goals. We teach our children that the only people who deserve respect and appreciation are the ones who come dressed according to an outdated and frankly patriarchal standard of respectability. We pass on ideals that have ultimately been used to harm communities like ours, instead of reinforcing the belief that creativity and innovation can come from anywhere, and it deserves respect. Our children need to learn what it means to fight "respectability" and advocate for each other. Fighting each other and advocating for respectability, as this policy encourages, only undermines the community that loves them the most.<doc-sep>Prince William slams BBC after report on methods used to secure Diana interview The wait is over, you can finally see this adorable panda cub Viral 'Charlie bit my finger' video to be taken down. Here's why See the highlights from the 2021 Billboard Music Awards (CNN) — At one high school in Texas, parents can’t just roll out of bed in the morning to drop off their kids anymore. James Madison High School in Houston has implemented a dress code targeted toward parents that has riled some people up. Principal Carlotta Outley Brown wrote in a letter earlier this month to parents that they cannot enter school grounds while wearing pajamas or revealing clothing. The school is also prohibiting parents from wearing leggings, sagging pants, low-rider shorts, short dresses and low-cut tops. Women can’t wear a satin cap, hair curlers, shower cap or bonnet on their heads. The new policy was implemented “to prepare our children and let them know daily, the appropriate attire they are supposed to wear when entering a building, going somewhere, applying for a job, or visiting someone outside of the home setting,” Outley Brown said. The guidelines follow reports that a mother was not allowed to enroll her daughter at Madison High School because she showed up wearing a T-shirt dress and a head scarf. However, some parents don’t agree with the new rules. Rosemary Young was handed a copy of the new parental dress code when she wore a satin cap to pick up her son from the school. She said she was in a hurry because her younger son had broke his arm earlier. “It doesn’t matter how a parent should come,” Young told CNN affiliate KTRK. “If we come here belligerent, out of control, things of that nature, that’s what you have the police for, but what I wear should never be an issue. I’m not revealing. I’m not doing anything. I don’t have any weapons.” Zeph Capo, president of the Houston Federation of Teachers, also thinks the school went too far. “Having body parts exposed is one thing. Turning someone away because their hair’s in rollers … is a little ridiculous,” Capo told CNN. “This is an issue of a principal issuing a dictatorial edict rather than having substantive conversation.” “Some of that stuff seems a little classist,” Capo added. Houston Independent School District declined to comment. Outley Brown did not respond to request for comment.<doc-sep>Screenshot : Twitter FOX2News A public school in Houston, TX has rolled out a dress code for parents that is every bit as racist and gendered as the words “dress code” usually imply. Advertisement According to the New York Times, the dress code for anyone visiting the campus of James Madison High School, a public school of 1,600 students, prohibits: “revealing and sagging clothing...as well as pajamas, hair rollers and satin caps and bonnets, which are often worn by black women to protect their hair.” The campus of James Madison High is 58% Latinx and 40% black, with three-quarters of its students qualifying for free or reduced lunch, prompting many to point out that these attempts to police appearance are being applied only to this particular community: “Roni Dean-Burren, a former teacher who studies literacy and school discipline and lives in Houston, spoke out on Twitter, saying the rules policed black women’s hair and bodies in ways that were not equally applied to white women “wearing leggings and wet yoga hair to their kids’ school.” In a phone interview, she said the school’s focus should be on student success and family engagement, not on how parents look. “It’s so far down the list of things to be concerned about,” she said.” Others worry that this arbitrary dress code will discourage parents from engaging with their children’s school for fear of being publicly shamed by school officials. Parents have already been turned away for not looking sn azzy enough to suit school authorities: Joselyn Lewis, the mother in Houston who said she was turned away this month because of her attire, told Channel 2 News that she had worn a T-shirt dress and head wrap to enroll her 15-year-old daughter, who was being bullied at another school. Researchers have found that school dress code policies, including restrictions around hairstyles and selectively-enforced rules about the way clothes should fit, disproportionately affect black girls, making it more difficult for them to attend class and adversely impacting their body image and confidence. Going after parents in addition to students seems like it can only make bad policies even more damaging. In an April 9 letter to parents, principal Carlotta Outley Brown told parents, “You are your child’s first teacher...We are preparing your child for a prosperous future...We want them to know what is appropriate and what is not appropriate for any setting they may be in.”<doc-sep>
HOUSTON — A Houston high school principal has implemented a dress code for parents because she says it is necessary to establish high standards for students, despite criticism that the move could be discriminatory. James Madison High School will turn away parents who show up to school wearing pajamas, hair rollers, leggings or certain other items of clothing, including bonnets. "No one can enter the building or be on the school premises wearing a satin cap or bonnet on their head for any reason," Principal Carlotta Outley Brown said in a letter to parents dated April 9. "You also cannot wear a shower cap of any kind in the building." Madison High's dress code was established shortly after KPRC-TV in Houston reported that a parent attempting to enroll her child was asked to leave because of her attire, which included a headscarf and a T-shirt dress. Another Madison High parent, Tomiko Miller, told the Houston Chronicle that she was "almost insulted" by the new code. "I really think it was discriminatory, the language that was used," she said. "It was demeaning. And I'm African American — and if it's misty outside and I have a hair bonnet on, I don't see how that's anyone's business." Zeph Capo, president of the Houston Federation of Teachers, called codes relating to women's hair "classist" and "belittling." "I'm sorry, this principal may have plenty of money and time to go to the hairdresser weekly and have her stuff done," he told the newspaper. "Who are you to judge others who may not have the same opportunities that you do? Having a wrap on your head is not offensive. It should not be controversial." Carlotta Outley Brown, who was then the principal at Peck Elementary School located in southeast Houston on April 18, 2018. Outley Brown took over as principal at James Madison High School during the current school year, becoming the school's fourth principal in five years. Marie D. De Jesus / Houston Chronicle via AP file Houston Independent School District policy allows schools to establish standards for student attire and grooming, but no policy exists concerning parents, the Chronicle reported. District administrators did not respond Tuesday to a request by The Associated Press for comment, and a message left for Outley Brown was not returned. "Parents, we do value you as a partner in your child's education. You are your child's first teacher," Outley Brown said in her letter. "However, please know we have to have standards, most of all we must have high standards." Also banned from school grounds are men wearing undershirts, parents wearing sagging pants or shorts, revealing tops, torn jeans "showing lots of skin," and "dresses that are up to your behind." Outley Brown, who is African American, took over as principal during the current school year, becoming the school's fourth principal in five years. She previously was the principal at a Houston elementary school that routinely met state academic standards and occasionally earned awards for performing above average, the paper reported. The elementary school at one point received one of the country's highest academic honors and a U.S. Department of Education publication noted at the time that Outley Brown, concerned that parents were showing up in "inappropriately informal dress," would explain to them that "they may not appear at school so dressed and firmly turned them away, as she did any parents using inappropriate language on school grounds." The push for parents to dress up has played out elsewhere. A dress code previously was pitched by lawmakers in Tennessee, where a bill sponsored by state Rep. Antonio Parkinson and one other ultimately was tabled. The bill would require all Tennessee schools to adopt a parent code of conduct that could include a parental dress code. Parkinson brushed aside concerns that dress codes could target one class or race over another, telling the newspaper that, "I'm not speaking about affordable as much as priorities. ... What could be a higher priority than bringing your child to school? You wouldn't go to a date like that."