A new report from the National Women's Law Center shows that one of the early ways Black girls are targeted and punished is through school dress codes. 

The report takes a look at schools in Washington D.C. and concludes that dress codes are unnecessarily strict and harmful to female students and that black girls specifically are often reprimanded or punished for violating these rules. 

The studied DC public high schools frequently rely on gender-based stereotypes, in turn, framing girls’ dress code violations as being “unladylike,” “inappropriate,” or distracting to male peers, according to the report. It goes on to say that schools also shame girls by forcing them to put on extra clothes that call attention to a violation, or punish them by pulling them out of class or sending them home — all of which affects their ability to learn and be productive. 

Seventeen-year-old Grace, a student at D.C.'s Duke Ellington School for the Arts told Vox the dress code at her school gives teachers and administrators a lot of discretion in determining whether a student is dressed inappropriately.  

“I’ve been told about my bra, whether I’m wearing one, the type that I’m wearing,” she said. “It makes me uncomfortable.”

For school administrators to think these young girls aren't noticing that they're being unfairly targeted would be foolish. 

Ayiana Davis, a 16-year-old student at Duke Ellington School of the Arts spoke on her experience with dress codes in the National Women's Law Center report. 

"I’ve noticed how my friends have gotten dress coded on stuff because they have bigger hips, bigger breasts, or bigger butts, yet I have worn similar things but I did not get dressed coded because I’m skinnier and it is less noticeable on me," she says. "That kind of thing teaches girls to be ashamed of their bodies."

The report goes on to show how exactly dress codes target black girls stating that "68 percent of D.C. public high schools that publish their dress codes online ban hair wraps or head scarves."

Researchers also found that black girls are nearly 21 times as likely to be suspended than white girls, and that "one reason for this disproportionate punishment is that adults often seen black girls as older and more sexual than their white peers, and so in need of greater correction for minor misbehaviors like 'talking back' or wearing a skirt shorter than permitted."

Black girlsdress codeWashington D.C.