California teacher kicks high school student out of class for wearing NRA shirt

A teacher at Lodi High School in Lodi, California, kicked a sophomore student out of class for wearing an NRA T-shirt, and reportedly told another student that she would have to write an essay if she continued to disagree with him.

The school administration later determined that the shirt did not violate the school’s dress code.

What are the details?

When two high school students decided to show up for class wearing NRA T-shirts, they were met with a lecture about the dangers of guns. One of them was then kicked out of class and sent to the principal’s office. The mother of one of the students said that she thought this was completely inappropriate.

“She was basically being attacked in class,” Charlene Craig, whose daughter was reprimanded for wearing the shirt, told KOVR-TV. “I think he’s there to teach. I don’t think he’s there to discuss his personal beliefs.”

The shirts in question had an NRA logo on the front and the shape of an American flag made with the back of shell casings. Below the flag were the words “National Rifle Association.”

Craig pointed out to KOVR that the school’s list of items that could not be depicted on clothing “clearly states ‘weapons.’”

According KOVR, the Lodi Unified School District said in a statement that “the school administration reviewed the T-shirts and determined that it did not violate school dress code policy.”

What is the school dress code?

The official dress code for Lodi High School bans clothing or jewelry depicting “money ($), playing cards, dice, drugs, tobacco, weapons, gang themes, gangsta, hustler, Chiefin’ shirts, alcohol, sexual contact, innuendo, or any reference to any of the above, themes degrading to any gender, ethnicity, or religion, characters wearing bandannas or other prohibited items or trench coats.”

The dress code also states, “Any potentially disruptive clothing or accessories may be restricted, as determined by Lodi High administration, at any time.”

Craig said that she would not stop her daughter from wearing the same shirt to the same class again.

“I’m going to continue to send my daughter to school in it. I don’t see that there’s a problem,” Craig said.

The school has said that it will “refresh all its staff” about the details of the dress code policy.