UK Tells Schools They Can’t Ban Afro Hairstyles

Source: NYT

RUBY WILLIAMS was 14 when a teacher stopped her as she walked down a corridor of her school in London and told her that her Afro hair was too big. A few days later, her mother, Kate Williams, said, the teacher summoned Ruby out of her class and sent her home, recommending some chemicals to straighten her hair. He did not allow her back until she braided her hair so it stuck to her head.

Her mother said Ruby had loved school, but after her experience had refused to get out of bed, and her attendance dropped. “They destroyed her,” she said.

Ruby’s case and that of other Black or mixed-race children who were disciplined for their hairstyles at school prompted Britain’s national equality body to instruct schools on Thursday that students should not be stopped from wearing their hair in natural Afro styles at school.

“You shouldn’t have to change your hair to get an education,” Ms. Williams said.

In 2010, Britain passed an Equality Act that stated that people must not face discrimination because of their race or ethnicity. The act did not specifically refer to hair and hairstyles, but anti-discrimination groups and Britain’s equality regulator, the Equality and Human Rights Commission, said that it was clear the law would apply when hair was associated with race or ethnicity.

Still, groups working on the issue said, many children with Afro hair experienced discrimination on a daily basis through attitudes and uniform policies that targeted the look of their natural hair. According to the commission, hair-based discrimination disproportionately affects girls and boys with Afro-textured hair or hairstyles.

Ruby’s school uniform policy at the time, according to a screenshot shared with The New York Times by her mother, Ms. Williams, stated that “Afro style hair, including buns, should be of reasonable size and length.”

Ruby’s school, the Urswick School in Hackney, did not respond to a request for comment. In a statement to British news outlets in 2020, the school’s governing body said it was “hugely distressed if any child or family feels we have discriminated against them,” adding: “We do not accept that the school has discriminated, even unintentionally, against any individual or group.”

It said its policy was informed by safety concerns, did not ban any specific color, length or style of hair, and was less prescriptive than those of many other British schools.

The Equality and Human Rights Commission said on Thursday that the aim of its new guidelines was to ensure that school leaders understood the law in this area by making clear that uniform policies that banned certain hairstyles without the possibility for exceptions based on racial grounds were likely to be unlawful.

They specified that the ban on discrimination includes natural Afro hairstyles, braids, cornrows, plaits and head coverings.

“I can’t believe some schools still think it is reasonable to police Afro hair — a huge part of our racial identity,” Ruby said in a message, adding that she was relieved that there was now detailed guidance on this. “I hope that this will prevent other children from experiencing what I did.”

Stephanie Cohen, the co-founder of the Halo Collective, a network fighting hair discrimination in Britain, said that hair had long been used as a racialized barrier. In the United States in the 19th century, for example, some churches hung combs next to their doors, and people could go in only if

the comb could run through their hair.

“This translates into these policies,” she said, referring to modern day school uniform rules. “It’s a barrier to education.”

The equality commission said that in 2017 it had also assisted another British child, Chikayzea Flanders, who was told that his dreadlocks did not comply with the school’s uniform code and was isolated from his classmates. His dreadlocks, the commission said, were a tenet of his Rastafarian beliefs.

Starting in 2019, several American states banned hair discrimination, preventing employers and schools from targeting hairstyles in ways that penalize Black employees and students, and codifying the link between racism and hairstyle.

According to Ms. Williams and the Equality and Human Rights Commission, Ruby’s family sued the school with the financial support of the commission for a breach of the 2010 Equality Act, arguing that their rule unfairly impacted Black children. In 2019, three years after Ruby was sent home for the first time, she received an out-ofcourt settlement of 8,500 pounds, currently about $9,800, from the school. The school, which is state-funded but run by the Church of England, did not accept liability, but it removed references to Afro hair from its uniform guidelines.

After her experience at school, Ruby started having panic attacks and suffering from anxiety and depression. Now, at 20, she is a university student and a makeup artist.

“She is in the process of rebuilding herself,” Ms. Williams said. https://silk-news.com/2022/10/27/world/uk-tellsschools-they-cant-ban-afro-hairstyles/

Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/27/ world/europe/uk-schools-afro-hair.html Image credit: ourarcticocean.org