Is your daughter a cheerleader? If so, does her cheerleading uniform include a super short skirt? If you wince every time you see your daughter don her revealing uniform then you know exactly how administrators at Monroe High School in Ohio feel when they see teen cheerleaders wearing their short skirts to class prior to football games.
All that leg was a bit too much for educators in the district, who recently banned cheerleaders from wearing their uniforms on school property during normal school hours. According to the Monroe High School’s principal, allowing the teens to wear the “short, tight, and slitted skirts” violates a new district-wide policy that states that all skirts worn to school can be no shorter than three inches above the knee.
The dress code was instituted after students began wearing their cheerleading skirts to class. According to school administrators, cheerleaders have traditionally worn their uniforms to Friday pep rallies before football games, but some girls took the liberty of wearing the revealing skirts to class the entire school day. Monroe High School cheerleaders are now mandated to wear clothing over or underneath the skirts while school is in session.
School administrators say they acknowledge that the skirts are cut short so the girls can complete the gymnastics moves required of a cheerleader; however the district’s superintendent noted that she wants students wearing appropriate clothing during the educational period of the day, and save the uniforms for game time.
It sounds reasonable to me, but parents of Monroe High School cheerleaders could not disagree more. They are irate that school administrators instituted the ban and went to a local TV station to voice their outrage. One mother of a cheerleader insisted that since she paid for her daughter’s uniform that she should be able to wear it to school on game day. Another parent pointed out that it’s tradition in many high schools for athletes and cheerleaders to wear their jerseys or uniforms on the Friday before a game and the ban discriminates against the female cheerleaders.
My daughter is not old enough to be a cheerleader and I haven’t worn a cheerleading uniform since middle school (and back then the uniforms were more like muumuus than skirted swimsuits), but I always thought that cheerleading skirts had built-in shorts or some other inner lining much like running shorts. Of course, that doesn’t address the issue of the skirt’s length. Still, I don’t quite grasp the ire being felt by the parents of those Monroe High School cheerleaders. Their daughters are still able to wear their skirts during school hours, albeit with pants over or under the skirt, and it’s not like the ban carries over to game time.
What do you make of the ban? Would you be upset if your daughter couldn’t wear her cheerleading uniform to class? What’s more, what kind of example are these angry parents setting for their children regarding such a petty issue.
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