Parents are raising concerns about a Catholic high school's dress code policy in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, that would have required their Black teen son to cut his shoulder-length locks, according to the Daily Beast.
Toni Schafer, the mother of 14-year-old Braxton, said the assistant principal at O'Gorman High School approached her last week during a school open house and raised concerns about the hair length of her son. She said Braxton had worn his hair in dreadlocks since he was eight.
The assistant principal called Braxton's hair length a policy violation, noting the uniform policy of O'Gorman that requires the hair of boys not to be touching the collar, according to the high school's website.
Mom says son has been wearing dreadlocks in school since 2018
Schafer told NBC News in an interview that this was the first time anyone in the O'Gorman Catholic Schools system had raised concerns about Braxton's hair length. She said her son has been wearing shoulder-length dreadlocks since he enrolled in the private Catholic school system in 2018.
Although Schafer did not specifically call out the Catholic school for discrimination, she did note that O'Gorman's reason for Braxton cutting his hair had nothing to do with the dress code policy. She added that her son has always been an outsider in the school.
The high school's current uniform code specifies that the hair length of boy students must be above the collar. Braxton's dreadlocks extended down to his shoulders.
According to Schafer, she reached out to Joan Mahoney, the school's principal, to discuss the policy and why cutting her son's hair was not an option for their family. She explained in an email that the length of her child's hair had just as much, if not more, cultural significance as the style.
Braxton decides to leave school at the end of the semester
She said that the important part of that cultural piece is the length of the lock and not the actual lock itself. Schafer added that after meeting with school administrators on Friday afternoon, they still could not find a suitable solution regarding the matter.
She was told by the administrators that her son having a man bun, or an updo hairstyle alternative, was still considered a policy violation by the school. Schafer said that this is about her son, and she wants him to be able to be comfortable. She noted that although school officials never used the term "expel" in their conversation, she felt it was implied.
Schafer asked the school's administrators if her son could stay on through the rest of the semester to finish his marching band and football season. The school eventually agreed to her request, saying that because her child's hair length had not been addressed during junior high, they felt Braxton should be allowed to stay at O'Gorman and continue his activities without having to cut his locks. Braxton will be leaving the school at the end of the semester, according to SiouxLandProud.
