Lakewood Teachers Check Girls’ Hair Length In New ‘Modesty’ Crackdown
Image by YouTube
A video clip that depicts teachers at an ultra-Orthodox school checking schoolgirls’ hair to make sure they comply with standards of so-called modesty standards has provoked outrage on social media.
Teachers at Lakewood Girls School Bnos Yaakov in New Jersey apparently took the action after administrators wrote a letter to the girls’ parents, declaring that their hair may not reach more than four inches below their collarbone, with the optimal length being two inches below.
The length should be measured with the hair left loose, the school wrote, though naturally while in class, any girl with below shoulder-length locks must tie them up in some fashion. If their hair exceeds the limit, the girls will be forced to have it cut, according to the letter.
The Lakewood school is not associated with conservative sects like Neturei Karta or the Satmar Hasids, but rather belongs to the relatively moderate Lithuanian stream of ultra-Orthodoxy.
The letter and the Youtube clip showing hair being measured have sparked much debate in the Haredi world.
One anonymous response to the video was, “If the school has an issue with a child’s hair length, it should be taken up privately between the administration and the parents. How DARE this school humiliate these girls in front of their classmates and teachers.”
It’s our birthday and we’re still celebrating!
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news.
This week we celebrate 129 years of the Forward. We’re proud of our origins as a Yiddish print publication serving Jewish immigrants. And we’re just as proud of what we’ve become today: A trusted source of Jewish news and opinion, available digitally to anyone in the world without paywalls or subscriptions.
We’ve helped five generations of American Jews make sense of the news and the world around them — and we aren’t slowing down any time soon.
As a nonprofit newsroom, reader donations make it possible for us to do this work. Support independent, agenda-free Jewish journalism and our board will match your gift in honor of our birthday!
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
