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Dress Code

All students are expected to follow the district dress code and grooming guidelines. Students receiving approval to opt out of uniforms still must follow the district dress code and grooming guidelines.

District Dress and Grooming Guidelines
The Board of Education subscribes to the philosophy that students will be provided with a quality education in a safe, secure environment. The Board believes that school dress also significantly influences behavior. Further, student appearance should be neat, acceptable, and in keeping with the activities at the particular school, while at school, or any school activity.
 
The basic responsibility for the grooming and dress of the student rests with the parent. The school must assume that parents have furnished guidance to the students in this manner. However, school personnel cannot avoid responsibility for making judgments regarding the appropriateness of dress and grooming in the school setting when health and safety factors are involved.
 
The principal at each school in the District, or the designated representative, is hereby authorized and directed to send home a student or require parents/guardians to provide a change of clothing for any student who has failed to prepare properly for school as set forth in this policy. Students who persist in violating the following general standards may be suspended in accordance with the law.

Standards for all students include:
  • All students are to give proper attention to personal cleanliness, modesty, and safety in dress and grooming.
  • Clothing is to be neat, safe, clean, and non-distractive to the learning environment.
  • No student is permitted to attend school if their appearance is disruptive to the operation and administration of the educational process.
  • Certain types of clothing that have the potential to cause disruption of school activities will be prohibited.
A. The Board believes that students should have a meaningful degree of personal freedom and should also accept reasonable limits and regulations consistent with a school's responsibility to provide opportunities for full and beneficial educational programs.

B. As an essential element of its function, a school should promote tolerance for a wide range of people and ideas, including, where appropriate, an understanding of the actions and appearance of those students who do not disruptively or inappropriately exercise their right and need to be individuals.

C. The District recognizes that student appearance is important to the student, to their institution, and to their community because of its dynamic, communicative nature. Standards should be established which are generally accepted by the larger community as modest, clean, and in vogue. Student safety must always be the foremost concern and the predominant criterion for the acceptability of student dress.

D. Clothing or articles of clothing or jewelry which may provoke others to acts of violence or be used as weapons, including but not limited to professional sport's team attire, gloves, any type of headwear, shoestrings, wristbands, belts, belt buckles, chains, and any other gang identified items are prohibited.

E. Clothing and jewelry shall be free of writing, pictures, and any other insignia or indications which are profane, obscene, sexually suggestive, or which advocate racial, ethnic or religious prejudice, tagging, gambling, violence, the use of drugs or alcohol or any other illegal activity.

F. Only unaltered school-affiliated headwear or medically/religiously required hats, as approved by the principal are allowed.

G. Shoes must be worn at all times. Thongs, backless sandals, and gang related boots are prohibited.

H. Oversized clothing, including oversized white t-shirts or baggy pants is prohibited. Pants/shorts must fit at the waist without requiring alteration. Shorts to the knee or longer worn with white socks or bib overalls (straps buckled at all times) are prohibited.

I. Gang associated red or blue belts, jackets, bandanas, or dark glasses that are not medically prescribed are prohibited.

J. Clothing shall be sufficient to conceal undergarments and shoulders at all times. See-through or fishnet fabrics, halter tops, muscle shirts, tank tops, tube tops, spaghetti strapped clothing, off the shoulder or low cut tops and bare midriffs are prohibited.

K. Other inappropriate clothing or accessories, including body marking or piercing, determined by the school administration to be a deterrent to safety or to detract from the educational process, are prohibited.

L. All students must conform to the Dress for Success policy (Policy 5441) expectations unless given a waiver by the site administrator.

M. The Board accepts the obligation to enforce reasonable standards based, in part, on the declaration of the California Administrative Code which provides, "A pupil who goes to school without proper attention having been given to personal cleanliness or neatness of dress may be sent home to be properly prepared for school, or shall be required to prepare himself for the school room before entering."
 
Nothing in this policy is to exclude provisions for reasonable and necessary dress and grooming regulations for special classroom or extra-curricular activities. The principal of each school shall be responsible for the supervision of the enforcement dress and grooming regulations in accordance with adopted standards and within the limitations of the guidelines of district regulations.


Legal reference:
35183
49066
California Administrative Code
Title 5, Section 302 12