The parents of a Greeley, Colo. girl are furious after their daughter was sent home from school over hair coloring.
Brentwood Middle School officials asked Ariel Davila to leave Monday when she came to school with newly dyed blue hair -- a violation of the school dress code for its affiliation with gang colors, 9 News reports.
Although district policy does not have an explicit provision on hair color, the school's own dress code specifically prohibits students from dying their hair "unnaturally red or blue." Ariel was not suspended, but told to go home until she re-dyed her hair to a permissible color.
Greeley-Evans Weld County School District 6 spokesperson Theresa Myers tells 9 News that the school's decision was not to punish Ariel on suspicion that she's affiliated with a gang, but that she could become a gang target for her hair. Still, the Davilas want a public apology.
"It's kind of something that makes me mad. It angers me," father Antonio Rogers said. "It's not acceptable for me."
Ariel is one of a number of students nationwide who have faced school action for changing her hair color. South Carolina student Rheanne Sargent was given in-school suspension last October for dying her hair pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month. School officials said the girl violated the dress code, which prohibits non-human hair color.
Another South Carolina student was suspended the prior April for dying her hair partially red. Hannah Adams received an entire week of in-school suspension at Riverside Middle School officials for violating a similar dress policy that prohibits "non-human hair color."
It was also in Colorado's Greeley-Evans Weld County School District 6 in September that 8-year-old Konnor Vanatta was told to remove a Peyton Manning jersey that he had worn to school. Manning's number, 18, is on the district's list of banned numbers for gang affiliations.
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