Earlier this month, an 18 year-old transgender student fought and won a battle to wear a tuxedo in his yearbook photo, despite his school’s initial reaction that the photograph would not conform with “community standards.”

As reported, the South Texas school refused to allow high school senior Jeydon Loredo to wear his tuxedo in his senior photograph because “they were a conservative school” and as a consequence,  his “photograph would be included only if he wore feminine attire, such as a drape or blouse.” As discussed in Dressing Constitutionally, yearbook photos have frequently been a locus for regulating students’ gender expressions, but the administration’s reasons often do not justify their actions because of First Amendment and Equal Protection Clause protections.

Joining Jeydon and his family, the Southern Poverty Law Center wrote the school district officials a demand letter, describing how the refusal to include the photograph “violates the student’s freedom of expression, which is protected by the First Amendment. It also violates the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment, which protects the student from discrimination, as well as Title IX, which bars discrimination on the basis of sex by any education program receiving federal money. Refusing to publish the photograph would even violate the school district’s own anti-discrimination policies.” The Center then threatened a suit against the District if they did not make a decision to include the photograph of Jeydon in the tuxedo within eight days.

Shortly after receiving the Center’s demand letter, the District came to a resolution that it would allow the photo, saying the decision was “in the best interest of the student and the school and the community.”

But as the Center said in a recent Press Release, the District allowing the photograph is much larger than just the best interest of Jeydon and the community — it sends the message “that transgender students should be recognized as important members of their communities rather than ostracized and subjected to discrimination.”

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A county jail in Texas recently made news when Gregg County Sheriff Maxey Cerliano commented publicly about the jail’s policy of “removing [inmates’] fake hair.” The jail requires “male and female inmates … to relinquish weaves, wigs and toupees” for reasons of “safety and security” and “the inmate’s personal hygiene.”  And Sheriff Cerliano estimates that they confiscate hair “pretty regularly” as the jail houses 11,000 people every year.

Per standard policy, an arrested person must turn over all personal property before she is placed in general population housing. At Gregg County Jail, a person’s property includes “artificial hair integrations.” When she is released, the jail will return her hair along with all her other property.

According to Sheriff Cerliano, an arrested person may remove her hair voluntarily, but Texas law gives staff the right to remove her hair for her, and even “the authority to cut [her] hair if [they] have to.” The Texas Administrative Code on Jail Standards states, “whenever clearly justified for health or sanitary reasons, the sheriff/operator may require a haircut” of the person.

In justifying the policy, Sheriff Cerliano told reporters that weaves specifically can be used as a weapon for someone to cause harm to herself or others. He also warns that hair can be used for storage and concealment of contraband. As discussed in Dressing Constitutionally, courts have often found this rationale convincing, but have also found that accommodations can be made for religious reasons or that the concerns have less force depending on the person’s gender.

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has received several anonymous complaints about the removal of hair at Gregg County Jail. But Sheriff Cerliano says the policy is applied “without regard to race or gender” — it “applies to male, female, white, black, Hispanic and any other national origin. It’s not about race.” Regardless of that statement, one might still wonder who is asked if her hair is fake, thus triggering the policy, and who is not asked. 

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At the end of last month, public schools in Pinellas County, Florida banned their own cheerleader uniforms in classrooms because the uniforms violate the schools’ new dress codes.

As reported, the ban is part of a “broader crackdown” to enforce the dress code and administrators will no longer turn a “blind eye” towards the fact that the cheerleaders’ uniform, typically worn to class on game days, violates the dress code.

Questioning why the uniforms are “suddenly too vulgar,” many cheerleaders and their supporters have reacted strongly to the switch from short skirts to track pants. They question why too much teenage thigh and academics don’t mix for the school year of 2013, despite the uniform being classroom appropriate for years.

But the administration has been staunch in their position, with one principal telling reporters that, though the skirts may be appropriate during the game, “a school has another purpose, and that’s academics.” The pushers of the policy also say the ban promotes egalitarian skirt length among cheerleaders and non-cheerleaders.

For now, one school in the district found an obvious compromise: longer cheerleader skirts.

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