by THARWA BOULIFI
Sarah Chaouachi, 16, proudly wears a marijuana T-shirt under her official school smock PHOTO/Sarah Chaouachi
As part of her back-to-school shopping, Sarah Chaouachi, 16, bought a collection of knee-length dresses that were modest and a fashionable alternative to the smock all girls must wear at her public school in Bougarnine, a suburb in the south of Tunis.
On the day she wore one of the dresses to school, an administrator yelled at her to go home and change her dress.
“She told me: ‘You’re wearing a dress. Girls don’t wear a dress to school.’ After a huge argument, she threatened to expel me. Expel me for what? For having the misfortune of being a girl and wearing a dress,” said Chaouachi.
The Tunisian Ministry of Education has a girls-only dress code policy. Girls are required to wear a smock over their clothes that covers their breasts, waists and hips. Boys can come to school in their ordinary clothes.
Many of the teens Teen Voices talked to in the southern suburbs of Tunis, Tunisia’s capital, consider the policies to be sexist.
“It is a great proof of inequality between boys and girls,” said Yosra Klouz, 17, a student at Cité Salem high school in Boumhel. “Why should I wear a smock? Because I’m a girl and I’m aoura.” In Arabic aoura means something that awakens the desire for males especially.
“In my school, girls aren’t allowed to attend classes unless they are wearing their smocks,” she said. “Some of them, have missed exams because of that. A few were expelled.” She makes a point to never forget to wear her smock.
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