On August 29, 2022, Hermiston High School welcomed new and returning students for the first day of school.  Hermiston High School has provided students with great career learning opportunities and useful skills.  Students are able to get a jump start and build a great foundation to helpmap their futures with every resource possible.  But what administrationand teachers have failed to recognize is that these students are still kids.  Filled with excitement and joy, students walked into the building, a place where students and staff should feel comfortable, safe and respected but many students were met with disrespect and unwelcoming attitudes.  The staff of Hermiston High School were lined up inside the main entrance ready to “dress code” and shame students before before offering a proper greeting to welcome the students.  Staff had many t-shirts on hand that were planned and ready to give out, planned and ready to shame.  

Did the Hermiston School District train staff on how to criticize and shame young women?  Did you appoint that as part of their job; to make young women and students feel as if they were less than everyone else for the clothes they chose to wear that day?  The approach of being ready to so proudly “dress code” students was aggressive and degrading.  Staff were NOT ready to greet first, they were ready to “dress code” and “dress code” only.  Stickers with sexualized terms would have done the same job as the t-shirts.  Students understand the rules were put in place to protect them, but who are they being protected from?  Why are they being protected?  Why is there anyone, especially adult staff, in the building that they should be protected from?  

Students are not angry about what their peers are choosing to wear, they are angry because of the manner in which their peers are being told and criticized on what not to wear.  The clothes students are choosing to wear are not disctracting any students.  Never has a student been verbally asked to change by another peer because they truly felt uncomfortable so who is uncomfortable here and why?

Feeling angry and defeated, the students respectfully ask to come to a reasonable, middle ground agreement.  After carefully measuring, we propose the dress code be: No more than 2 inches of midriff be shown and no more than 3 inches below the collarbone be shown.  This is a reasonable proposal as clothes should be allowed to be a form of self expression and a way for students to feel confident and comfortable.  The chest of students is not their fault.  The 3 inch proposal is only an inch longer than the average t-shirt will sit. We hope to be met with respect and we hope no one feels disrespected and mocked for what they choose to so confidently wear.

(Written by Adriana Gutierrez, senior at Hermiston High School)