(NAME-MCE) Baggy Pants

[Myrasara at aol.com]

In a message dated 9/18/2007 9:54:53 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
winnsandra at gmail.com writes:

As a  list serve dedicated to equity, I would love to read a
discussion about  this matter. What does this law bring to your mind? When,
if ever, is it  necessary to impose laws as a dress code enforcement? How do
you think this  law will work as a deterrent for elementary children to
follow suit (pun  intended)? How do we help to make racial profiling  stop


I am an infrequent contributor to this list, but as a special education  
teacher (and writer on multicultural issues) who spent the last four years in  
middle school, including three in East Harlem, I would like to address this  
question.
 
First of all, although baggy pants did start as a "ghetto" style, part of  
hip-hop culture, it is yet another style that suburban kids have picked up,  
though not as widely. It was even parodied in "Borat," for those of you who saw  
that movie last year. As a teacher, I found the style offensive and feel that 
it  helped promote an overall focus on clothing and style rather than on 
learning. I  experienced one episode, as I was "pushing in" to an English class 
taught by  another teacher who I was helping, when a young man whose pants were 
somewhat  loose, bent down to pick something up and had a wardrobe malfunction, 
i.e. the  pants fell down to reveal not just underwear but a bare bottom. 
Needless to say,  this episode destroyed the lesson. Our AP had to call his 
mother in. 
 
I have become a convert to school uniforms, and if you want to call me  
old-fashioned or backward, so be it. I'm in my second year teaching at a  different 
NYC public school which has a firm uniform policy (white tops and  gray pants 
for boys, gray sweatpants for  girls on gym days and in  cold weather; green 
plaid skirts other times of the year), and I find that this  policy refocuses 
students on learning and simplifies the process of getting  ready for school. 
Classes that perform well are granted uniform-free days from  time to time, 
but they have to earn it. I'm now teaching in a special education  resource room 
on the elementary level in a K-8 school.
 
>From colleagues at my previous school, I have learned that a uniform policy  
has now been implemented there. The administration has made it more 
complicated  than necessary, in my opinion, by having each of the three grades (6, 7, 8) 
have  different color schemes, i.e. blue pants and blue shirts for one grade, 
other  colors for others - I don't know the rules. It can become 
unnecessarily  complicated for parents.
 
Anyway, those are my two cents in this matter. 



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