Napa schools loosen dress code

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Aug 12, 2007 | by Paul Elias, Associated Press

SAN FRANCISCO -- A Northern California school district reluctantly -- and angrily -- announced Friday it will loosen a dress policy that was so restrictive a student was disciplined for wearing a denim skirt and socks portraying the cartoon character Tigger.

The American Civil Liberties Union and a prestigious San Francisco law firm took up the student's case on behalf of other students who had been disciplined at Redwood Middle School in Napa for violating the dress code. The Napa Valley Unified School District put the dress code in place at the middle school in the mid- 1990s to squelch gang activity.

The ACLU sued in March, accusing the district of stifling free speech. According to the suit, students were punished for wearing T- shirts with the Christian message "Jesus Freak," pink shoes and blue jeans.

The school's policy banned denim and required students to wear solid-colored clothes in blue, white, green, yellow, khaki, gray, brown and black.

In July, a Napa County judge ordered the school to suspend enforcement of the code.

But the district sent parents informational packets for the coming school year that included the dress code at the center of the dispute. After lawyers threatened to seek a contempt of court order, the district on Friday announced its new dress code, which ACLU attorney Julia Mass said appears to have removed the offending restrictions.

"We are not going to challenge it," Mass said. "I believe it addresses the concerns."

But Mass noted the new code was labeled as an "interim dress policy" and the ACLU won't seek dismissal of the suit until a permanent code is adopted.

School district superintendent John Glaser said the school's safety committee will soon consider a permanent code. Glaser said the school was reluctantly seeking to end the lawsuit only because of the mounting litigation costs and he urged parents who support the old dress code to voluntarily comply with its provisions.

"We believe that no students' free speech rights were, in fact or intent, violated at Redwood Middle School," Glaser wrote in a two- page press release. Glaser said if the suit is resolved, the district "probably will not be able to present our substantial evidence of gang related issues that have been prevented by this policy."