A transgender student reportedly refused to leave the costume she had worn for the prom because she was denied entry to the university in Alabama.
The scholar at Section High School in Jackson County, Alabama, attended the homecoming on April 6 with a group of companions.
According to regional news agency WAAY 31, she was reportedly forbidden from entering the building unless she changed out of her dress and put on a pair of jeans.
A mother of a male student at the school, Lesa Drake, got a visit from the party to let them know what happened and she headed down it to fight the superintendent, Blake Wigley, about the selection. The school therefore called the police.
“I kept asking why. Why can’t she come? Because she’s wearing a gown. Another transgender students were present, but they did not do so in their beginning female attire. What exactly is bad with this problem? And he kept saying,’ I told her tuesday,'” Drake told WAAY 31.
Although Wigley reportedly told the mother that Drake couldn’t find a relevant policy in the school’s handbook, she was able to find one when she checked the student entrance herself.
“I looked at the student book, and there’s absolutely nothing in it, and there’s nothing in the graduation area. And the commander who was present taped everything,” she claimed.
Newsweek contacted Wigley, the college’s vice director and the Jackson County School Board by internet for comment. We even contacted Drake by information.
The student handbook for Jackson County School District does not mention any transgender policies, but it does start with a mission statement that states that it “will provide educative opportunities for children on a nondiscriminatory foundation.”
“No man may be denied the benefits of any education program or exercise on the basis of race, color, disability, creed, national origin, time or sex”, it reads.
One section, which deals with dress code, and the other, which deals with eligibility requirements for students to attend graduation, might be related to the incident.
T-shirts with offensive information, fishnet stockings, and pajamas are prohibited from being worn at school, according to the dress code.
Nevertheless, that section lists a disclaimer that states the vice principal or head of school “may deem acceptable clothing or appearance.”
The evening is described as a “formal occasion and both students and dates if clothing correctly,” according to the policy section on prom.
According to the Alabama office of the legal advocacy group ACLU, dress codes at public schools “can’t be explicitly discriminatory”.
That means that while dress rules may allow for certain apparel types, requirements for certain clothing may never change based on a student’s race or sex, it stated on its website.
“For instance, a dress code don’t need girls, and even women, to just wear skirts or dresses and boys, and only boys, to wearing pants or a jacket and tie. The same goes for royal events and special events, like graduation, magazine photographs, or graduating. A school may specify’ proper attire, ‘or perhaps’ gowns or tuxedoes,’ but it can’t require that girls, and even girls, wear gowns or that boys, and just boys, wear a tux.”
It added that students, “whether transgender or cisgender, must be allowed to wear clothing consistent with their gender identity and expression.”
The Southern Poverty Law Center added that “you have the right to wear clothes that correspond to your gender identity at school,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Drake discussed the alleged decision to outlaw the transgender student from wearing a dress.
Who cares what they wear without a doubt? And these kids, if they’re not seen or heard, kill themselves. You know, would I rather my son wear a dress to prom or off himself? Wear that dress to prom without a doubt. Who cares? It’s nobody’s business. And just like, who cares who you’re having sex with”, she said.
In 2022, aimed at transgender students, which LGBTQ+ advocacy group Human Rights Campaign described as” the single most anti- transgender legislative package in history”. It was the first state to ban the use of puberty-altering hormones or other” to alter the appearance of or affirm the minor’s perception of their gender or sex” by anyone under the age of 19 in the state.
Even if the student doesn’t want their parents to know, a law passed that year mandated that schools be in the know about the gender identity their child exhibits at school.
Additionally, the governor of Alabama passed a law mandating that students use the restrooms only in settings where their gender is recognized at birth.