Where's the free in Norwich Free Academy?

Count me among those frustrated by, and perhaps even fed up with, seeing boxers, briefs, thongs and butt cheeks above too-baggy jeans and too-tight slacks. The proclivity of cleavage is out of control too. Such displays can cause distractions to the educational functions of a school and should not be tolerated.

Still, though, the "free" is gone from Norwich Free Academy with its recently revised dress code. The new standard requires that all pants be worn at the waist. Females cannot display cleavage. No pajamas. (I'm good with that.)

It also, however, continues well beyond the legitimate restrictions on indecent exposure.

"Appropriate dress," student affairs director John Iovino said recently, means students shouldn't wear to school what they would wear to a concert, the beach, a picnic with friends or even to gym class.

And therefore, all shorts and skirts must extend at least to the knee. Jeans can't have holes. Sweat pants are allowed only in gym classes.

I applaud Mr. Iovino's standard of standards. Unfortunately, though, I contend that he and the committee with which he worked (which included three students) ultimately, and perhaps inadvertently, conspired to impose their interpretation of acceptable dress on the student body. It gets more restrictive.

Students will not be allowed to wear multicolored T-shirts, or tees with lettering or logos. So NFA T-shirts would be disallowed at NFA. So would ones that say, "end the war" or "live green," or "peace" or "KKK."

The rule stifles young people's freedom of speech or expression. And that, to me, is a dangerous and disconcerting disruption of the educational process. That it would happen in an educational institution where free thought, tolerance, acceptance and open discussion among people with differences of opinion are supposed to be taught, nurtured and encouraged, is most frightening.

Someone else's attire might be personally painful to me. But it is my American responsibility to accept, even defend, their right to wear it, and to get over it, as long as they do not verbally harass or provoke me, or physically intimidate or threaten me. The offensive shirt should provoke discussion, not whining or violence.

In 1969, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that teachers and students "do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate. This has been the unmistakable holding of this Court for almost 50 years."

It said so in Tinker v. Des Moines School District (1969), which is considered one of the most important U.S. Supreme Court cases on student rights.

It continues: "The Fourteenth Amendment ... protects the citizen against the State itself and all of its creatures - Boards of Education not excepted. ... That they are educating the young for citizenship is reason for scrupulous protection of Constitutional freedoms of the individual, if we are not to strangle the free mind at its source and teach youth to discount important principles of our government as mere platitudes."

The case came about after three students in Des Moines were suspended for wearing black armbands to protest the government's policies in Vietnam. They wanted an injunction against the hastily invoked regulation banning the armbands. The school district feared that the armbands might cause friction among students.

The Supreme Court took into account both the district court's and appellate court's (upholding) decision in crafting its own opinion, which reversed the others:

The District Court concluded that the action of the school authorities was reasonable because it was based upon their fear of a disturbance from the wearing of the armbands.

But, in our system, fear of disturbance is not enough to overcome the right to freedom of expression.

Any departure from absolute regimentation may cause trouble. Any variation from the majority's opinion may inspire fear. Any word spoken, in class, in the lunchroom, or on the campus, that deviates from the views of another person may start an argument or cause a disturbance. But our Constitution says we must take this risk, and our history says that it is this sort of hazardous freedom - this kind of openness - that is the basis of our national strength and of the independence and vigor of Americans.

In order for the State in the person of school officials to justify prohibition of a particular expression of opinion, it must be able to show that its action was caused by something more than a mere desire to avoid the discomfort and unpleasantness that always accompany an unpopular viewpoint. Certainly where there is no finding and no showing that engaging in the forbidden conduct would "materially and substantially interfere with the requirements of appropriate discipline in the operation of the school," the prohibition cannot be sustained.

The policy needs rethinking.

This is the opinion of Chuck Potter.