The teachers said they couldn’t control themselves around the girls.

The Backlash

Thursday, a junior girl stopped me in the hallway between third and fourth period. She crossed her arms and told me I was making the whole school look bad.

She said colleges were going to see all this negative attention and think our school was a mess. She asked why I had to be so dramatic about a dress code that wasn’t even that serious.

I tried to explain about Alyssa and the other girls who got harassed, but she just rolled her eyes and walked away. Two other students I didn’t know gave me dirty looks in the bathroom later.

Someone wrote on the stall door that protesters were ruining everything for everyone else. The criticism felt worse than I expected because part of me wondered if they were right.

Friday at lunch, I sat alone at a table in the corner picking at my sandwich without really eating it. The cafeteria noise felt too loud and I kept thinking about college applications and whether this whole thing was worth potentially messing up my future.

Alyssa slid into the seat across from me without asking. She put her hand on the table and spoke.

“Thank you for not giving up.” She said.

She told me that seeing guys actually stand up for what happened to her made her feel less alone than she’d felt in months. She said knowing someone believed her enough to risk detention and angry classmates meant everything.

I felt the doubt in my chest loosen a little bit. This wasn’t about my college applications or what other students thought.

It was about making sure girls like Alyssa didn’t have to deal with teachers who couldn’t control themselves. Friday night, the football game turned into another flashpoint.

Half the team showed up to warm-ups wearing their compression gear instead of practice uniforms. The athletic director marched onto the field during stretches with his clipboard and his face already red.

He told Guile and the other captains that if we didn’t change into regulation uniforms immediately, he would forfeit the game. Our opponents were already on the field watching this whole mess unfold.

Parents in the stands started yelling questions about what was happening. The athletic director gave us five minutes to decide.

Guile pulled the team into a huddle near the bench. He said we needed to find a middle ground that kept our message visible without completely destroying the season.

He suggested we change for the actual game but wear the compression gear during the pre-game team walk through campus. That way, students would still see us making a statement, but we wouldn’t lose the game and mess up everyone’s stats.

The athletic director agreed after Guile promised we’d be in full regulation uniforms before kickoff. We walked through the main quad in our compression gear with the whole school watching before heading back to change.

It felt like a small win for keeping the protest visible without sacrificing everything.

The Official Record

Saturday afternoon, my parents called me into the living room for a serious talk. They sat on the couch looking concerned while I took the chair across from them.

My dad said he’d noticed my grades slipping in a few classes over the past two weeks. Requested Reads is on Spotify now; check out the link in the description or comments.

My mom asked if this protest was affecting my ability to focus on college applications and schoolwork. They said they supported what we were trying to do, but they worried I was sacrificing too much of my own future for this cause.

The conversation felt heavy, and I couldn’t quite meet their eyes while they talked. I went to my room and grabbed the documentation folder I’d been keeping since this started.

I brought it back downstairs and spread everything across the coffee table. I showed them the original policy screenshots, the detention slips showing selective enforcement, and the documented timeline of every inappropriate comment Cortonhorst made to female students.

I explained this wasn’t just about a dress code. It was about teachers who looked at teenage girls in yoga pants and couldn’t control themselves enough to teach a class.

It was about a principal who thought protecting teachers from distraction mattered more than protecting students from harassment. My mom got really quiet while she looked through the papers.

Then she looked up at me and said she was proud of me for standing up even when it was hard. Sunday night, I checked my email before bed and found a message from Margarite Parsons.

The subject line said “Formal interview request”. She wrote that she needed to conduct an official interview with me Monday morning before first period.

The email listed specific incidents she wanted to discuss, including the overheard conversation between Cortonhorst and Coach about seeing girls’ underwear through their pants. She asked me to bring any additional documentation I had.

The tone was professional but serious in a way that made this feel very real and kind of scary. I screenshotted the email and sent it to the group chat so everyone knew the investigation was moving forward.

Monday morning, I walked into the district office building at 7:30 for the Title 9 interview. Margarite met me in the lobby and led me down a hallway to a conference room with a long table and uncomfortable chairs.

She sat across from me with a legal pad and a recording device between us. She explained the interview would be recorded and asked if I understood my rights.

I nodded and she pressed the red button. She started with basic questions about when I first noticed the dress code issue and how the protest began.

I walked her through Alyssa running out of class crying, the assembly with Van Debette, reading the policy that night, and realizing it only said girls. My hands shook a little holding the water bottle she’d given me.

Margarite wrote notes in neat handwriting while I talked, occasionally stopping me to ask for specific dates or exact wording. When I got to the part about overhearing Mr. Cortonhorst talk about seeing girls’ underwear through their yoga pants, she made me repeat it twice to make sure she had the quote right.

She asked who else heard it and I gave her Tyrone’s name. Her face stayed completely neutral the whole time, giving me no clue what she thought about any of it.

The interview lasted ninety minutes, and by the end, my throat hurt from talking. She thanked me for my time and said she’d be in touch if she needed clarification on anything.

I went straight to first period after the interview feeling drained. Tyrone texted me during lunch saying Margarite had pulled him out of class for his interview.

By the end of the day, five other students had been called in. TJ, two girls from the volleyball team, someone from the tennis team, and Deedee all got interviewed.

We compared notes in the parking lot afterward. Everyone said Margarite asked detailed questions about specific incidents and took careful notes but never indicated what she was thinking.

The investigation was clearly getting serious. TJ said she’d asked him about grade changes in certain teachers’ classes, which meant she was looking at possible retaliation too.

The whole thing felt bigger than just the dress code now.

The All-Male Committee

Wednesday morning, I was walking to second period when Lucille caught up with me in the hallway. She had her laptop open and showed me what she’d found.

The dress code policy committee that wrote the new rules consisted of five people. It was Principal Van Debette, Mr. Cortonhorst, Coach Creeperson, the athletic director, and the assistant principal.

All men except Van Debette. There was zero input from female teachers, zero input from students, and zero input from parents.

Lucille had filed a public records request and gotten the committee meeting minutes. She’d already written the article, and it was going live on the school paper’s website at lunch.

She showed me the draft with the committee composition listed right next to quotes from the policy text about girls and form-fitting clothing. The contrast was damning.

When the article posted, it spread through the school within minutes. Students were screenshotting it and sharing it everywhere.

By the end of the day, parents were calling the school asking why an all-male committee got to decide what teenage girls could wear. Thursday morning, Van Debette’s voice came over the intercom during first period.

She announced a listening session for that evening at 6:00 in the library where students and parents could share concerns about school climate. Her tone tried to sound open and welcoming but came across as defensive.

At lunch, Alyssa’s mom texted the group chat warning us this was a pressure release valve. Van Debette wanted to let people vent so she could say she’d listened without actually committing to changes.

But Alyssa’s mom said we should still attend and document everything that got said. She reminded us to stay calm, stick to facts, and not let anyone bait us into emotional reactions.

A Room Full of Truth

That evening, I showed up at the library at 5:45. Students were already filling the chairs arranged in a circle.

Parents stood along the walls, and staff members sat in a cluster near the door looking uncomfortable. The library felt too small for the forty students and dozen staff members crammed inside.

Van Debette stood at the front next to a podium someone had wheeled in. She opened by saying she wanted to hear all perspectives on the recent concerns about school climate.

Her arms stayed crossed over her chest, and her shoulders hunched forward. She said everyone would get a chance to speak and asked that we be respectful of different viewpoints.

The first few students who spoke gave generic comments about wanting to feel safe and respected. Van Debette nodded along and thanked each person.

Then it was my turn. I pulled out my phone and opened the screenshot of the original policy.

I read the text out loud word for word, emphasizing where it said, “Girls must not wear form fitting athletic wear.” .

Then I asked why “girls” was specified if the rule was meant for everyone. Van Debette’s face tightened.

She said the policy was written with common understanding in mind and that everyone knew what it meant. I asked what “common understanding” meant and why it wasn’t written clearly if that was the intent.

She stumbled through an answer about maintaining professional environments and appropriate attire standards. Nobody in the room looked convinced; a few students exchanged glances.

Van Debette moved quickly to the next speaker. Alyssa stood up, and the room got very quiet.

She talked about how being told her body was a distraction made her feel like she was responsible for adult men’s behavior. Her voice stayed steady, but her hands gripped the back of the chair in front of her.

She described walking into class every day wondering if her clothes would be a problem, if a teacher would stare, or if she’d get sent to the office. She said the dress code made her feel like her body was something shameful that needed to be hidden so teachers could do their jobs.

Several girls in the room started crying. One of the female teachers wiped her eyes.

Even some of the male staff members shifted in their seats, looking uncomfortable. Alyssa sat down and nobody spoke for a long moment.

A parent from the back stood up, said his name, and that he had a daughter in tenth grade. He claimed we were attacking good teachers who were just trying to maintain professional standards.

He said the dress code was reasonable and that students today didn’t understand appropriate boundaries. Before anyone could respond, Michaela Houston stood up from the other side of the room.

She introduced herself as a parent coalition organizer and said she’d brought data about gender bias in dress code enforcement. She pulled out printed charts showing that nationwide, girls receive dress code violations at six times the rate of boys.

She cited studies about how sexualized dress codes harm girls’ educational outcomes and mental health. She spoke calmly but firmly, making eye contact with the opposing parent.

The data made it impossible to dismiss the concerns as overreaction. The listening session continued for another hour with more students and parents speaking.

Van Debette took notes but made no commitments about policy changes or next steps. She thanked everyone for sharing and said the administration would take all feedback into consideration.

The session ended at 8:00, and people filed out looking frustrated. But as I walked toward the exit, I noticed a man in a suit sitting in the back row.

He’d been there the whole time, just observing without saying anything. Alyssa’s mom caught my eye and tilted her head toward him.

After we got outside, she texted the group chat explaining that was the district superintendent. His presence meant the district was taking this seriously at the highest level.

The listening session might not have produced concrete results, but someone with real authority had witnessed everything.