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A school wants to approve students' prom dresses beforehand

A school has been accused of sexism after claiming it needs to approve students’ dresses before prom [Photo: Took a pic via Pexels]
A school has been accused of sexism after claiming it needs to approve students’ dresses before prom [Photo: Took a pic via Pexels]

School dress codes have been clocking up plenty of headlines of late. And yet one more is about to set the Internet off.

The latest clothing controversy comes after a school has been criticised by parents and pupils for requesting that “dress-wearing” students submit photographs of their proposed outfits ahead of their school prom.

According to The Journal Sentinel, Pewaukee High School recently emailed parents to remind them of a policy that has been in place since 2015 – that dresses must be approved before they can buy tickets to the dance.

Understandably, parents and students have reacted in outrage to the move, with some calling the policy “sexist”. Others claim it should not be down to female students to alter their clothing to prevent their male peers from getting “distracted”, which is an oft-cited reason for such strict dress codes.

“The girls are essentially being held responsible for the wayward thoughts (administrators) think boys have,” Rebecca Sheperd, whose daughter attends Pewaukee, told the The Journal Sentinel. “They’re being told, ‘You are the problem.’ These are the roots of rape culture, frankly.”

But the Pewaukee Superintendent Mike Cady claims that the dress code isn’t sexist because it also prohibits male students from wearing low trousers that expose their underwear.

However, his comments to the publication did not address the fact that only “dress-wearing” attendees are required to have their outfits approved in advance.

And both male and female students told Journal Sentinel that girls were called out for dress-code violations in school more than boys, with one telling the publication “Guys wear tank tops all the time and don’t get dress-coded.”

School dress codes have been clocking up headlines of late [Photo: Pixabay via Pexels]
School dress codes have been clocking up headlines of late [Photo: Pixabay via Pexels]

This certainly isn’t the only example of schools causing controversy over what has often been described as double standard dress code violations.

First there was the group of boys who turned up to school in skirts in protest about being banned from wearing shorts.

Then, when girls at a High School in California were sent home for wearing off-the-shoulder shirts, boys protested by wearing off-the-shoulder tops of their own.

And back in May a group of female students protested what they described as a ‘sexist dress code’ after being told their clothes were a ‘distraction.’

Back here in the UK a school was accused of ‘sexism’ after issuing a request asking parents to measure the length of female pupils skirts.

And earlier this year a number of students at Ebbsfleet Academy in Kent, were refused entry to their first day of the new term because their skirts were deemed too short.

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