Our daughter is a Camas School District 5th grader.  A couple weeks ago she was thrilled to have newly-done bangs of different colors.  Then the Principal confronted her, not discreetly and privately, but in front of her peers in the lunchroom, where he made her take off her knit cap, shamed her for her hair, and made her feel two inches tall.

A District-wide elementary school rule claims that “Hair gels or dyes, unnatural in color, are not acceptable.  These colors may include blue, pink, green, etc.”  Similar rules have been found unconstitutional (Massie v. Henry, McNew v. Surry County School Board, see also Jesse Doyle, VA).  Moreover, the District actually approves bright hair colors to express “spirit” on “spirit days,” and the middle schools have no such rule at all.
  
District “Mission and Beliefs” states, “We believe that each student has worth and dignity as a human being and deserves to be treated with respect in every situation.”  Helen Baller’s newsletter advises students to “Respect the dignity, privacy, and freedom of all individuals.”  The Principal has repeatedly confronted our daughter, most recently to decry the insufficiencies of a flower clip worn to cover the fading remnants of hair dye.  Harassment and disrespect for the student is the real obstacle to learning here, not hair.

We hope this message encourages other parents to defend students’ constitutional right to wear their hair any way they wish.