Although she had been warned, Michelle Mitchell, a senior at Proviso West High School, said she was stunned Tuesday morning when a security guard ordered her out of the line of students waiting to rent textbooks.
“He said I had to go to Room 107,” Mitchell said.
There the student saw an assistant principal, who said her attire– shorts and a pink T-shirt with a picture of a dolphin and the word “Florida”–was out of compliance with the school’s tougher dress code.
After Mitchell, who lives in Melrose Park, was directed to the detention room and told she could not attend classes, she called a neighbor for a ride home.
The new dress code was created July 15 by Proviso High School District 209, with Proviso East in Maywood and Proviso West in Hillside, and a letter with details was sent to student homes July 22 by Supt. Eric Eversley. He said the code is part of his effort to raise the standards of the two high schools, which long have had some of the poorest academic performance among suburban high schools.
“Dress and appearance of students should be appropriate for a serious academic setting,” Eversley told parents and students in the letter.
The code bars 15 forms of attire, including T-shirts, shorts, bare-midriff shirts, hats, nonprescription sunglasses, spandex wear, jogging suits, jewelry with obscene or satanic statements, gang attire such as bandannas, and low-cut blouses.
Among eight types of permitted dress are full-length slacks or pants, skirts or dresses no shorter than 2 inches above the knee, shirts with collars and shoes with matching laces.
Most of the students, “looked good today,” said Diane Dyer-Dawson, Proviso East principal.
Last year, she said, “Our students dressed in ways indicating there were not serious about school.”
To reinforce the message of the earlier letter, a sign posted outside of Proviso East states, “Students must follow dress code to attend class. No T-shirts.”
Dyer-Dawson has ordered security guards and teachers to bar students “blatantly out of compliance” from class. Then parents or other designated adults are called. On Monday, 180 of 1,800 youngsters were cited, but on Tuesday the number was down to 35.
“The kids understand very well now,” said Dyer-Dawson, who had three complaints from parents.
At Proviso West, Maria Pauls of Melrose Park, whose son Anthony is a junior, was incensed at receiving a phone call Tuesday from a school administrator who said his T-shirt and shorts were not proper attire.
“I cannot afford to buy new clothes,” said Pauls, who said her home is a trailer and she lives from paycheck to paycheck.
Anthony Pauls was one of three students sent out of a first-period accounting class to the dean’s office.
He was ordered to a detention room filled with alleged dress code violators, then told to go home to change clothes.
Mitchell, who also said she cannot afford clothes to comply with the code, said the school has not said what penalties would be imposed for violations. “I expect to be suspended,” she said.
She said that although she agrees with the need for a dress code, “it shouldn’t be so strict.”
Also, the school should have an “opt-out” policy for students in financial distress, she said.
Proviso West school authorities could not be reached for comment.
