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Dress code policies have always been prevalent in schools. Normally, what children can and cannot wear in schools is explicitly noted in school policies or .

The issue of the vast and sometimes exhaustive list of dress code policies of what cannot be worn has not had any resolution across localities and countries.

The problem with trying to develop a set of guidelines for school dress code policies is that the implementation or restriction of dress is just not about the clothes that kids wear. Dress code policies are mired in larger contested debates that have to do with , reflective of a .

How school educators and policymakers set parameters of dress in schools creates a with little consensus or resolution.

Most obviously, the nature of many dress code violations . The vast majority of cases have targeted girls and on the basis that what one might wear reveals too much — that it’s sexually suggestive, or to the of the community.

Shaming

Those who are not part of the “norm,” particularly those children whose self-identity goes beyond traditional gender types, to stricter dress code infractions than . Similarly, .

Tank tops, spaghetti straps, bare shoulders, cleavage or no cleavage, shorts that are too short, midriff, shirts/pants regulations . The list is exhaustive.

The infractions for noncompliance exacerbate the shaming of girls’ self-perception of their worth. And yet it points to the basic assumption that girls’ bodies are shameful — something that is to be covered, evaluated or objectified.

And when their bodies are not covered, it supposedly sends a clear message that girls are at fault should something wrongful be done to them; they somehow deserved such a fate.

This narrative, whether intended or not, plays to the broader social movements beyond simply that of dress codes. Dress code policies mask broader issues such as one’s right to their own bodies.

Dress codes minimize the increasing public outcries over sexual harassment and assault that have been made so public with the explosion of the #MeToo movement. Conversations around issues of systemic racism or discrimination are also further cloaked.

Forms of dress may be curtailed in schools when they challenge dominant religious views. When schools or boards ban particular types of religious dress, . They may feel a broader form of systemic discrimination lurking behind this ban.

Creating inclusive, body-positive dress codes

If schools are going to remove this shackle of the perpetual dress code wars in schools, let educators and policymakers call it for what it is – a diversion behind the more significant public issues that remain intensely contested and vociferous.

If educators and policymakers are genuinely worried about the safety of their students or the decorum of dress codes, schools could simply follow in Illinois. The high school’s fundamental “rule” mandated that certain body parts must be covered for all students at all times. Specifically, students must wear their clothes in a way that fully covers their genitals, buttocks, breasts and nipples with opaque fabric.

Such a simple yet inevitably provocative dress code policy removes the broader contested aspects of gender, sexual identity, faith or systemic discrimination.

If society is concerned about cultivating students’ attentiveness regarding etiquette and decorum in light of our community values, let’s make space in schools to discuss the root of these issues through meaningful political dialogue rather than using dress codes to obscure and cloak the more pressing and substantive issues.

, Professor Werklund School of Education,

This article was originally published on . Read the .