Who Should Dictate Dress and Behavior at School Activites?

There's been a lot of discussion around these parts regarding appropriate dress and behavior at school sponsored dances. The controversy began when a local district proposed some guidelines for their upcoming "Turnabout Dance". (For those of you old fogies like me who didn't know what this was, it's what we used to call a Sadie Hawkins dance.)

The local district posted guidelines for the dance including a ban on "grinding" on the dance floor and a dress code that stated that girls' dresses must be at least fingertip in length.

The students' reactions were strong and probably not too surprising. They quickly announced a boycott of the dance and proceeded to schedule their own "alternative" dance at a local hall. Due to low ticket sales, the original school dance was cancelled.

What came as a surprise to many was the reaction of the parents. Many parents came out in support of the students who felt this was unfair and unwarranted. Parents were instrumental in helping the high schoolers organize the alternative dance and have been very vocal in the local media calling out the high school administration for interfering in what they feel should be a family decision.

I have to admit, I was caught a bit off guard by the parents' reaction. It seems that more often than not, parents are upset with the local public schools for going "too far" when dealing with their kids. Topics like sex education always bring out parents who want the schools to lean more toward the conservative side when dealing with the kids. No condoms on banana lessons needed, we'll take care of that at home! Birth control is a private matter - we'll take care of that lesson too, thank-you-very-much. Very rarely (at least around here) do you have parents accusing the schools of being too Puritanical.

So what do you think? Whether you are the parent of a teen or a toddler, this issue is going to come up sooner or later. Do you think the schools have a right to ban suggestive dancing or "grinding" at school sponsored events? Do they have a right to impose a dress code and was this one reasonable?



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