By Mary Presley
In 90 degree weather, less is always better. But short shorts, halter tops, spaghetti straps, and skirts that dangle halfway down the thigh are not acceptable attire for school according to the Lane administration.
Lane updated the school dress code over the summer with the most noticeable change calling for shorts or skirts to be at least knee-length. The previous dress code mandated that they had to reach one’s finger-tips (when arms hang down flat against the body).
The new dress code will indeed be enforced this year, but some girls have not yet accepted it.
“Why do they have to be to your knees? We are not nuns.” said Jenal Ortiz, Div.481. “Especially for a tall girl like me. No skirt that I’m going to buy will come down to my knees. The shorts length for a tall girl is not going to change. We have long legs, so our skirts are going to still look short.”
Ortiz is not the only student with complaints.
Jovana Flores, Div. 377, claims some students are overlooked when it comes to violations in the dress code.
“I do not see why I can not wear finger tip length clothes, when the cheerleaders’ and the volleyball players’ uniforms are to their butts. It is not fair that they have priority over everybody else,” said Flores, who has been sent to 210 by her division teacher this year to put on sweat pants.
Trips to the Discipline Office for dress code violations has proved a deterrent to wearing skimpy clothes for some.
“Last year when it was really warm like it is [at the beginning of the school year], I would wear shorts or skirts that weren’t fingertip length and I would wear spaghetti straps without a cover up. Now I do not really bother. I just wear jeans,” said Daphne Trujillo, Div. 360, who finally grew tired of being sent to 210 last year for dress code violations.
According to Dr. LoBosco, the administration changed the rule for skirt and short lengths because the fingertip rule was being ignored by so many.
“We were getting really short shorts in the summer, so we figure if we ask for them to be knee length, then the shorts would be longer,” LoBosco said.
In hopes that the more conservative policy will lead to more conservative fashion choices, the administration seems to understand that there will always be students who bend the rules, even a few inches at a time.
