From a teen's perspective: School dress codes

All  my life, movies and TV shows about school have all tried to enforce one concept: what you wear is important. The Plastics in Mean Girls wear pink on Wednesdays, their hair in a ponytail and jeans once a week or else they are no longer considered “cool”. In High School Musical, Sharpay, the “pretty” one, is always in the most fashionable, fancy, pink outfits. Sandy from  “Grease” is only able to get the guy once she completely changes her style to something less traditional and is more revealing .

Now, I’m not trying to imply anything about these movies. I love all of them and have seen them countless times but there is a nuanced problem here: society, through school dress codes, is simultaneously telling kids there is a specific kind of clothing that will make you cool, and this kind of clothing is distracting.

We’re taught from a young age that in order to be part of the “in crowd ” we must always wear tight shorts, short skirts, and sleeveless shirts, spaghetti straps, or off the shoulder tops. High school is idolized by movies, putting in youth’s brains that it’s the best time of your life and that you are cool or you are nothing. So, we try to be cool. Really what we want is to wear pajamas to school every day but that is beside the point. 

The issue is that the very thing the media is telling us we need to be successful in life is hindered by dress codes especially for girls and women. Additionally, the enforcement of these rules disproportionately hurts those who wear “feminine” clothes. 

I’m addressing dress codes, not school uniforms. I completely understand the appeal of a school uniform: less pressure on students based on how they look, simpler for parents, and helps to make students of a lower socioeconomic class not feel left out based on the clothes they wear. Dress codes are a completely different ball game. You must balance how to make clothes still respectful for school and teach children how to dress for the workplace while allowing students to express themselves through clothing. 

Making sure clothes a student wears is what people would wear in the workplace instead of a club makes sense. The issue is when feminine clothing is attacked by these rules. No shoulders shown, no spaghetti straps, the fingertip rule (your shorts cannot be shorter than how long your arms are beside your legs). Not only do some of these rules just not make sense (the fingertip rule) but they’re also teaching girls that they must change how they are in order to serve their male counterparts. 

The common excuse is the word “distracting”, but the question is “Distracting to whom?” Your male counterparts? Your teachers?  The hypersexualization of young women in dress codes is a problem. Everyone has shoulders. Straps are not distracting. Young women should be able to show their shoulders in school. Or more of their leg than the fingertip rule allows. This makes moving around less awkward and makes it easier to find clothes to wear. 

It’s not the end of the world if a shoulder shows. The media has taught us that if a shoulder doesn’t show then it is the end of the world and we will have no friends. This disconnect needs to stop. Ideally, the media would be filled with people wearing anything they want regardless of their gender. People would be able to be cool in a sweatshirt, a sleeveless top, a long sleeve tee, or even a nice polo shirt. The media should show people being considered “cool” regardless of their exterior. Kind, empathetic people who treat others with love and respect are what we need. 

There must be synchronization of the media and school dress codes in order for us to move into this type of society where all women feel empowered.  The school dress codes need to stop promoting systemic sexism and allow for ladies  to be treated as humans and not pieces of meat. Simultaneously, the media needs less emphasis on what people wear. With both of these actions, girls  will feel respected in schools and society will begin to realize that “cool” is a social construct.