A school district just south of Houston, Texas has placed an administrator on leave after allegedly using a black marker to fill in a child's buzz cut pattern.
Juelz Trice, a seventh-grade student at Berry Miller Junior High in Pearland, said an administrator approached him to let him know his carved haircut violated the school's dress code policy.
Trice told ABC13 in Houston that the administrator gave him two options: color in the hair carving or go to in-school suspension (ISS).
"He came over and said, 'You have two options: You can either go to (in-school suspension) or color it in,'" Trice told the tv station. "Everyone was coming up to me. It was like the talk of the school that day and the day after."
The dress code in the Pearland Independent School District states: "Hair must be neat, clean and well groomed. Extreme hair styles such as carvings, mohawks, spikes, etc. are not allowed."
The PISD's dress code doesn't say how the district would respond to any violations, but did issue a statement, saying: "A campus administrator mishandled disciplinary action by giving the student options including notifying his mother, disciplinary consequences or filling in the shape of the hair carving with a marker. This latter practice is not condoned by the district and does not align with appropriate measures for dress code violations. … The campus administrator is currently on administrative leave. Further action is forthcoming."
Erica Simons, the ABC13 reporter who interviewed Trice and his parents said, "Juelz Trice's parents have received an apology for his head being drawn on, but they're not sure if it's good enough. They raised Juelz to be respectful and comply with adults, which is why he didn't resist."
The story comes on the heels of a nearby Houston ISD school issuing a dress code policy for parents. James Madison High School stated this week it will no longer allow parents to enter the school wearing pajamas, shower caps, hair rollers, "Daisy Duke" cutoff shorts, jeans torn from the buttocks, house shoes that look like bedroom slippers, low-cut tops that reveal breasts, sagging pants and other attire that "are showing your bottom."
"We are preparing our children for the future and it begins here," the note sent home to parents said. "Parents, we do value you as a partner in your child's education. You are your child's first teacher. However, please know we have to have standards, most of all we must have high standards."
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