Students who come to school dressed for summer are making waves at the high school. Short skirts, cut-offs, low-cut shirts, and short-shorts are common sights around town in the summer. However, when mid-august rolled around and school started, the Dakota Valley High School dress code made this look unacceptable, which upsets some students.

[I don't like the dress code because I feel as if it's pointless because it's not really enforced and people disobey it anyways. I don't think it distracts from learning at all. I could care less what someone is wearing, unless it's really cute and I may want it for myself,” said Jade Hofer. ]

According to the student handbook, school clothing should be appropriate as to time, place, and weather. Specifically, shorts are allowed if appropriate, but bare midriffs, shirts with “spaghetti straps”, tattered clothing, hats or caps, t-shirts with slogans referring to alcohol, drugs, tobacco and obscenities, and bare feet are not.

[Everyone has different perspectives on when something is ‘too’ revealing and then becomes a dress code violation.  I think that they can become a distraction.  Also some things can promote negative activities or be seen as offensive to some students and staff, like a Hooter’s or Marlboro T-Shirt.  Schools that have uniforms report that students often also like them as you don’t have to try to decide ‘what to wear’ each day.  Uniforms also take away the issue of judgment calls as to what the dress code violations are.  Some schools don’t require uniforms, but require for example that all shirts have a collar.  The downside of uniforms is that you lose some of your individualism because everyone wears similar clothes,” says Jerry Rasmussen.]

Staff members at Dakota Valley try to enforce this as much as they can, but the task is difficult.

[“I found it works better to pull a student aside then to ask them in front of others and say that they need to change because the straps are too thin or there is too much showing,” said Mrs. Haag]

The difficulty of the task has some wondering if requiring uniforms would make solving the problem easier. Kylie Dunn, a junior at Dakota Valley doesn’t think so.

“The dress code is broken when school is first starting up due to the weather being warm still, and when spring comes because people are antsy for summer again,” said Dunn. “These two seasons in the year is when the dress code is abused the most. If you go into the weight-room, you might see boys with cut-offs and you can see their chest and stomach. You walk the halls the first day of school, and you might see shorts that are too short and shirts that are too low.”

Teachers are to give students a warning to change clothes if they are in violation, and if nothing is done the student is to be sent home. There is no official punishment laid out for students who refuse to change inappropriate clothing, but some think there should be.

 “I think that OSS, ISS, and detention would be a bit much, but if that student that is being addressed doesn’t want to cooperate with the teacher, they should be sent to the principal’s office and have to call their parents.”