School sued over Winnie the Pooh socks
Categories: Education
Toni Kay Scott, a 14-year-old student at Redwood Middle School, is a rebel. Instead of sticking to the school's dress policy requiring students to wear cotton, twill or chino (no denim), in solid blue, white, green, yellow, khaki, gray, brown or black, she gave administrators the proverbial finger by sporting a pair of Winnie the Pooh socks to class.
And the school retaliated, sending Scott to Students With Attitude Problems, an in-school suspension program.
However, according to the ACLU, the dress code is unconstitutionally vague and too restrictive -- violating the California Education Code -- so they've filed a lawsuit in the Napa County Superior Court.
Says Toni "Stick-it-to-the-Man" Scott, "We should be able to show everyone who were are and have a way to express ourselves, as long as we aren't showing off things that shouldn't be shown off in school.
While I can understand the motivation for implementing a dress code, it's infuriating when schools abandon common sense in enforcing rules to the letter. I hope they're firmly spanked by the courts.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jenn 3-21-2007 @ 11:02AM
There's more to this than just wearing Winnie the Pooh socks though. If you read the article, the girl also wore a denim skirt when denim is not allowed. I suspect that if the rest of her clothing had been up to the school code then the socks would not have been a big deal at all.
What worries me about this whole thing is that this girl is being taught that if there are rules in life that you don't like, just don't follow them. It's certainly not a message I want to pass on to my children.
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Ally 3-21-2007 @ 11:03AM
I disagree. The dress code said "solid" in reference to the listed colors, which means no designs, pictures, etc. Just because Pooh isn't offensive doesn't mean she didn't break the rules. The fact that her parents decided to sue the school based on this is the most disheartening fact of the case - people are making so that children can no longer get an education because schools are too worried about getting sued to do anything but cater to the students' every whim. The parents should have chalked this up to a lesson learned: when you break the rules you pay the consequences, no matter how trivial those rules may at times seem.
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Kellie 3-21-2007 @ 11:21AM
If this was me, my parents would probably have grounded me for breaking A RULE. It doesn't matter if you agree with it or not, it's rule. There are rules that are meant to fight and to be broken. This is a rule that will serve her in life and fighting this is sending the child the wrong message.
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Clarissa 3-21-2007 @ 1:28PM
Is this a public or private school?
If it is a public school I say more power to the parents. Kids are not cattle and should not be treated as such. I can imagine that wearing the same colors day in and day out would get very very boring. What's wrong with other colors and some kind of design on the clothing? You know NORMAL clothes.
If it's a private school...well then that's a different story..she should follow the rules.
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Justine Lemmon 3-21-2007 @ 2:24PM
She goes to a school with a DRESS CODE. Sure Pooh today, next it will be those stupid bunny or I'm tighter than spandex socks.
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Hippie 3-21-2007 @ 1:11PM
The school district is going to waste a lot of money defending themselves in this lawsuit. Money that could be spent educating the kids. The headline of the story is misleading. The girl was out of uniform. From my reading of the article it looked like her skirt, blouse and socks were all unacceptable. The headline should've been "Parents sue because girl doesn't want to wear a uniform to school."
Kids should be creative and express themselves with things that matter, academics, sports, art, music, etc...They shouldn't be taught to think that how they dress is somehow "important or creatve".
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Sage 3-21-2007 @ 3:33PM
I never considered myself to be a "law and order" type of gal, but being a mother seems to have brought it out in me!
For the most part, I agree with the comments thus far - the rules are the rules and it's a slippery slope once you start to disregard them. I'm not saying that one should never challenge the law, but come on folks, let's be reasonable here!
The irony in all of this came straight out of the horse's mouth: she's advocating self-expression, so long as you don't "show off things that shouldn't be shown off at school." Hmmm....and who do you suppose should determine what sort of things "shouldn't be shown off in school? THE SCHOOOL PERHAPS!?!?!!
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SKL 3-21-2007 @ 8:22PM
I think this school got confused in deciding whether it had a uniform or a dress code. What kind of dress code decides what colors you can wear or whether you can have a pattern on your shirt? Sorry, but I think that's stupid.
I agree with teaching kids to follow rules. If I were in her parents' place, I would probably have forced her to follow the rules even though I think they are stupid, as long as they would not risk danger or discrimination.
However, I probably would protest this ridiculous dress code in some way. Once again, this is all about arbitrariness and power trips. There is a big difference between disrespect (as in butts sticking out or swear words on t-shirts) and a reasonable expression of fashion and taste.
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Belinda 3-22-2007 @ 11:16AM
Rules are made to be followed not broken!!
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Rachel May 3-22-2007 @ 12:31PM
With any and all rules, there are times, places and attitudes to have correctly when challenging them. Using your kid is NOT one of them -- and to me that's just exactly what these parents did. They sent their kid to school in the wrong clothes so she'd get disciplined so they could sue. Over clothing.
This teaches the kid that she doesn't have to follow the rules - Mommy will come in and just sue! Nice.
I agree with previous posters -- it's a huge waste of money for the school, when the parents could have gone through the right channels and advocated change.
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