Tuskegee students begin semester amid new policy banning durags and bonnets
Tuskegee enforced a policy banning students from wearing durags and bonnets.
As students began the fall semester at Tuskegee University on Wednesday, they were subject to a new dress code that prohibits them from wearing bonnets and durags -- commonly worn head coverings in Black culture to protect textured hair and preserve hairstyles -- in classrooms and public spaces on campus.
The private historically Black Tuskegee, Alabama, institution made national waves last month when students were notified of the policy, which extends to all "other non-religious or non-medically required head coverings" as well as revealing clothing and bedroom shoes.
In an email to the student body obtained by ABC News, Tuskegee president Dr. Mark A. Brown explained that the new rules are intended to "prepare [students] with a solid foundation for the workforce".
"Employers are less forgiving and too often presentation may overrule stellar preparation," he wrote in the email.
In an interview with ABC News on Wednesday, Brown stood by the dress code policy -- repeatedly characterizing it as a means for "student success".
He cited conversations with "industry" and "company CEOs" that helped inform his decision making.
"The way you dress may have everything to do with the first impression that you make. ... whatever is appropriate, you need to have practice before you get there," he said. "And I don't think that you, your parents, and others should invest four or five years [at Tuskegee], and then you not know how to make a dynamic, incredible first impression on day one at work."
Critics have contended that the campus dress code policy would not have the impact touted by Brown.
Dr. A.D. Carson, an associate professor at the University of Virginia specializing in hip-hop and race, stated that wearing formal attire doesn't eliminate one's experiences with racism.
"In an anti-Black world, you're going to face negative impacts for anything," he said, "Also, let's be serious, nobody's wearing a bonnet or a du-rag to a job. And to pretend that's the thing that people are doing is silly."
Tuskegee sophomore class president Rayne Caldwell criticized the policy in a video statement.
"In the name of preparing us for the workforce, the university is policing our cultural hair coverings in completely casual settings," she said.
She also expressed her disappointment that a historically Black university would enact a policy targeting culturally specific garments.
"We already know how to conduct ourselves as Black people in white spaces. We don't need the university to emulate those spaces in the name of preparing us," Caldwell said. "Why treat us that way in one of the few places in the country where we are the majority?"
Tuskegee University is not the first Historically Black College or University (HBCU) to require students to follow a formal dress code. Several other institutions across the nation have enforced dress code policies for decades, including Hampton University and Morehouse College.
Carson told ABC News that HBCUs have historically been a "training ground" for students to prepare them professionally for corporate America.
"HBCUs were going to be the place where the best and brightest were produced, and so part of being the best and brightest also meant the way that you presented yourself to other people," he explained.
"People that were coming out of HBCUs not only had to present themselves as intellectually cream of the crop, but they also had to look the role, and this meant that folks would often engage in dress codes," he added.
In his announcement of the policy, Brown said faculty "will be empowered" to enforce these policies.
He clarified to ABC News that if students disobey the dress code, the administration will reinforce the policy to ensure that they are aware of how they are "expected to be attired."
"If they choose not to do that, then the student is saying they choose not to be a student at Tuskegee," Brown said. "Now I don't expect that extreme. ... I expect the students to learn and move on."
The university's policy has revived debates on whether dress codes perpetuate anti-Black stereotypes against students.
Carson said that Tuskegee's decision to enforce a dress code reflects a "preference" that is harmful as a policy.
"When you make it into a policy, we're introducing those young people into the kind of danger that we're trying to protect them from," he explained.
Institutional dress codes reflect a greater history of policing the attire of Black Americans, according to Carson. He cited the 2012 death of Trayvon Martin, which sparked national debates on racial profiling based on him wearing a hoodie.
"We can't really divorce that history from these kinds of policies because we also know that when there are dress codes in schools across the country at whatever level, the people who face the most disciplinary action are people of color," he said.
Brown asserted that the policy is intended to not make students "comfortable," but equipped to achieve "incredible things."
"My job is not to have the larger social discussion on the unfairness, for instance, of a corporate environment or job placement in America," he said.
He said students have "to know how to succeed."
"That's not anti-Black. In fact, I would argue economic empowerment and ability to play in a capitalistic environment: that's exactly what we want for everyone, and certainly we want it for Black people, for people of color, for everyone," he said. "Isn't that what we want? Don't we want to close the wealth gap in America?"
Brown told ABC News that no students have been disciplined under the dress code policy since their return to campus last week.
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