By Charminae George
Public opinion seems to indicate that Afrocentric hairstyles in schools should be allowed across the board.
Educational institutions should not be determining if they are permitted.
A quick survey of 15 randomly selected persons in St John’s yesterday revealed that many believe that students should be allowed to wear hairstyles such as locs and afros, as long as they are properly groomed.
“I think that children should be allowed [whether] boy, girl, male, female, to wear their own natural hair, whether it is cut short, whether it is long, as long as it is groomed,” one mother stated, summarising the stance of 13 of the 15 persons interviewed.
However, the topic of hair extensions is a source of debate.
“When it comes to children with fake hair and extensions, I don’t think that should be allowed in a school space…When they get out of school, they can make a choice whether to wear braids,” the mother added.
“…You don’t want someone’s hair, lime green in the classroom…However, black braids, brown braids, depending on whatever hair colour you have, it shouldn’t be a problem for us to wear it,” a young adult said.
Discussions surrounding hair policy in schools have been sparked by various incidents over the years. The most recent incident occurred in September 2022, when a five-year-old girl was unable to attend the New Bethel SDA Academy in Liberta due to having locs.
In August, the Ministry of Education issued a hair policy document outlining mandatory guidelines for a school’s hair policy.
It states that hair should be ‘free of foul odour or contagions’, ‘neat, groomed and orderly presented’, and should not ‘be a distraction to the general school population’.
These guidelines are in accordance with Section 49 of the Education Act, 2008 which gives a school the authority to ‘introduce rules to govern the attire, conduct and discipline of students’, as long as it has been approved by the Director of Education.
Persons have asked for more clarification on the hair policy document with one social media commentator questioning the attributes of a distracting hairstyle and whether it is a valid concern.
“What is deemed as a distraction to others? I am teaching in an environment where students have the freedom to wear their hair as desired. To date, I have no empirical evidence to indicate that hair color or hair style is a distraction to learning,” the person said.
Caribbean islands such St Kitts have recently made amendments to similar legislation which now allow students to wear natural locs, afros, hair extensions (natural colour only), and beads above grade three level.