An Oklahoma school superintendent has just landed in hot water over her enforcement of the school dress code, namely asking female students to bend over and allegedly deeming those who wore their shorts too short “skanks.” Take it from me, superintendents just don’t understand.
On the very first day of school at Noble High School (in Noble, Oklahoma), Superintendent Ronda Bass, who is “very proud to be known as ‘Mama Bear Bass’ noticed several violations of the dress code policy.'” Um, it’s the first day of school. It’s the only day of school all year when students can successfully play dumb and get away with “spaghetti straps” or short shorts. Anyone who has been anywhere near a high school during the first week MUST be aware of this tacit buffer period. But Mama Bear is protective, you see. So during an school assembly on that first day, Bass ever-so-politely addressed the dress code violations.
“The first question I asked was how many of you in here believe that there are female students on the campus today that are dressed completely inappropriate,” says Bass. “Most of their hands went up.”
But according to a student at the assembly, that’s not what Bass said:
“The first sentence was, ‘Have y’all ever seen any ‘skanks’ around this school’. Around the end she said, ‘I don’t want to see anyone’s ass hanging out of their shorts.”
Well that’s a bit different, isn’t it? When KFOR asked Bass if she used those words that the student mentioned, she responded:
“I knew that students from other towns were calling our girls really negative names. The message I wanted to send to them was I don’t want them to be called those names,” says Bass. “I want us to be known as the classy lady Bears.”
Ugh, everything about that sentence is awful. So she’s not denying at all that she used the word “skank” to refer to her female students. She is blaming her female students. And she’d rather cite complaints she heart through the grapevine than take responsibility for slutshaming her own students. Great. Bass went on to perform dress code checks, singling out only girls and even asking some to bend over because, in her words, “If you’re not comfortable with bending over, we might have a problem.”
Bass then sent an email to the faculty informing them that the female students are “pushing the limits” and that the teachers should stay on top of dress code enforcement “until a new norm of modesty is established.” WHAT. This is like if Margaret Atwood wrote Degrassi. The fuck.
Once again, female students are subject to the dress code while male students are not even addressed. It’s totally unacceptable and very creepy how much Bass is focusing on her female students, singling them out, and making a point to criticize and humiliate the teenage girls. The assertion that someone is “protective” does not give them permission to cross boundaries—asking students to bend over to see how short a dress is is absolutely inappropriate and disgusting.
In response, it looks like furious parents are passing around a petition to have Bass removed from her position. That’s right. They’re formally asking the school board to drop the Bass. Well, let the Bass be dropped, I say.