A Nova Scotia mother has started an online petition after her daughter was disciplined for wearing shorts to school.
Julia Davison says her daughter was one of a handful of girls at Truro Junior High School who were told their shorts were inappropriate and distracting to the school’s male population.
She says the students were told that, with their arms down at their side, their shorts could be no higher than their fingertips.
“I don’t think she’s being singled out for the shorts. I think she’s being singled out because she refused to comply with the rule that really isn’t there,” says Davison.
Davison says the school’s dress code isn’t specific about its definition of “inappropriate.” As a result, she has launched an online petition, asking the school to reevaluate its policy and the reasons her daughter was given for not being allowed to wear the shorts.
Parent Jamie Northrup is supporting the petition. She picked up her daughter, Grade 8 student Coraleigh Nelson, at lunchtime on Tuesday after she was given detention for wearing shorts school officials said were too short.
“I’d rather she was around people that love her and support her than to be somewhere where I don’t think she’s being treated fairly,” says Northrup.
“They’re saying it’s a distraction, though nothing’s where it shouldn’t be,” says Nelson. “It’s covering our butts…it’s just completely unfair.”
Officials with the Chignecto-Central Regional School say there may be slight variations between schools over what is appropriate dress for the classroom. However, once parents and students are notified of the rules, they say it’s important that students follow them.
“When you’re choosing to openly defy something you’ve been asked to abide by, you sort of automatically roll into that discipline, that progressive discipline area,” says school board spokesperson Debbie Buott-Matheson.
Nelson says she plans to fight the dress code and intends to wear her shorts to school again Wednesday.
“I’ll take the suspension, I’ll take the detention, as long as it’s getting the point across,” she says.
With files from CTV Atlantic's Dan MacIntosh
