Andrew Jones, father and star athlete at Amite High School in Louisiana was able to maintain a 4.0 GPA throughout his school year granting Jones the honor of beinghis class’ valedictorian. However, he was denied his right to walk with his class all because he refused to shave his face!
“How can you take away his moment? You will never feel his pain, and you can never give his moment back to him …,” Jones’ aunt Sabrina M. Davis said in a Facebook post.
Tangipahoa Parish school superintendent Mark Kolwe told ABC News that the school has a policy which forbids facial hair on male students and that Jones was given three warnings.
“I personally asked him to please go and shave so that he can walk with the other kids. He chose not to. I even asked the parents standing here to have him follow the policy.” Kolwe added that other students who were asked to shave their faces all went home and did just that, he says they “took care of what they had to do and marched.”
Jones alleges that the school never enforced the policy until the day of graduation, so he refused to abide by it, costing him one of the biggest moments of his life.
He’s getting support from Amite City mayoral candidate T.R. McGee, who took to Facebook to describe the situation as “not fair due to inadequate disciplinary polices” and demanded that the school issue a public apology! He wrote, “If the school was to discipline this adequately, one could easily see the justification. By them not enforcing this policy adequately, the school should first offer a public apology.”
Despite this ridiculous rule, Andrew Jones will be attending SLU on academic and athletic scholarships and has a spot on the football team! He wishes to become a professional athlete or a team trainer one day.
TSR STAFF: Talia O. @theclosetratchet on Instagram & @tallyohhh on Twitter!
Source: http://abcnews.go.com/US/valedictorians-beard-booted-hs-graduation-march/story?id=39254408
