Bianca Voss During gathering last week, Mr. Coberly and Junior Iz Gius announced new modifications to the dress code set in place to create a less sexist set of guidelines for students to follow. The previous dress code stated that certain clothing items such as tops showing a girl’s stomach or shoulders are not acceptable, because they are considered “distracting” to students. This influenced Iz to make a change. During her second semester of sophomore year, Iz took the Gender Studies class on the Global Online Academy. For the end-of-year project, she had to design a gender equality initiative within her local community, and Iz decided to focused on Latin’s dress code. “I saw a lot of gender bias in the way the dress code was enforced, and wanted to make some kind of change,” explains Iz when asked to elaborate on the reasons for focusing on the dress code. Over the summer, in cooperation with Mr. Graf and Mr. Coberly, the initiative was set in place, and the language in the handbook regarding dress code was changed accordingly. Junior Sandy Nguyen states that, “Dress codes, more often than not, enforce this idea that women’s bodies are shameful and indecent. There’s an issue with policing female students for what they wear, since you’re sexualizing young girls and humiliating them when they are dress coded. It’s discrimination against women, and I’m glad Latin has taken this step to become less sexist. I hope this can inspire students at other schools to get rid of dress codes too.” Many students, in addition to Sandy, support the change in dress code, and hope that more schools take this initiative to create an equal environment for students to learn and succeed. ]]>