Senior Sports Bras at Central

On Friday, September 16, Champaign Central High School’s football team played Centennial High School, kicking off Central’s Homecoming weekend. Students from Freshman to Seniors gathered to cheer on their team. Several administrators supervised the event, enforcing football spectator rules. One rule, in particular, was highly enforced: “no sports bras”.

For many years, senior girls have decorated black sports bras to celebrate their senior status. They use glitter, paint, rhinestones, and more to write their graduation year or draw the school’s mascot. Ali Williams, who is a senior, talks about watching her older sister participate in the tradition. Williams says, “It’s a really fun thing that we get to do and get excited about. We get together and it’s special for the seniors. It’s also fun that senior girls have a tradition of their own and it makes football games more fun.”

So, when the rule of “no sports bras” was announced, senior girls who’d been preparing for the tradition were surprised and confused. Megan Hannah, a senior, said: “On the announcements the day of the game, they told us that we needed to wear a shirt in order to walk in. Everyone thought it was a little ridiculous, so most of us planned to just wear jackets and once we got into the stands, we would take them off.”

When the girls did this, though, they were immediately targeted. “About twenty minutes into being in the student section, two female teachers walked over to the senior girls and told us we needed to put on our jackets or we were going to be kicked out.” Hannah said. “Most of the girls didn’t want to make a scene. It was obvious they didn’t agree with what was happening but they complied and put on their jackets.”

However, Hannah refused to agree to the policy. “I started questioning the teachers, asking them why we were being told to put our jackets on. They told me that it was a new school policy, that it wasn’t them that were making the rules, but they had to enforce them. I could tell the teachers were getting frustrated because I wasn’t doing immediately what they asked, but also because they didn’t have answers to my questions. At that point, they told me they were going to have to kick me out of the game. I agreed, because if the only choice was for me to leave or comply, then I wanted to leave.”

Hannah was the only senior to be kicked out of the game, but other girls questioned the teachers and the policy. “When I started asking why we had to put our jackets on, one of the administrators made me come out of the student section to talk to her,” Williams said, “she told me that it was a ‘Unit 4 thing’ and that it was a ‘family event’, which didn’t make sense because none of our parents or anyone around us cared about the bras.”

Senior girls questioned the rule partly because barely, if any, rules against dress at Central are enforced. “The entire time I’ve been at Central I’ve never been dress coded and I’ve never had anyone around me be dressed coded”, Hannah said. “The fact that dress codes aren’t strict in school itself, compared to being punished at an open public event was so confusing and there didn’t seem to be any reasoning. It was just baffling.” Williams says, “I could wear a sports bra to school and no one would say anything to me. It’s just weird. At least be consistent with what you’re doing.”

The “no sports bras” rule at the Homecoming game seemed to have no explanation. Williams said, “The rule was announced the morning of the game. All of us had already made our bras and were looking forward to it. If they gave us time to hear about it, there probably wouldn’t have been as many problems at the game.” Hannah says, “The fact that the policy was sprung upon us the day of, that it was so out of the blue, and there was no talk about it before it happened just didn’t seem fair. They didn’t give an explanation beforehand and couldn’t give us an explanation at the game,” Megan said.

The yearly homecoming football game has been notoriously rowdy and heated, with trash being thrown at opposite teams and fights often breaking out. So, further regulations for football spectators by Unit 4 superintendent Sheila Boozer are understandable. Central game day expectations are posted on Unit 4’s website through a PDF, stating familiar rules, such as students providing a school ID to enter, requiring fans to remain in the stands for the entirety of the game, and no loitering. The “no sports bras” rule is listed along with these enforcements.

Perhaps Boozer believes that permitting sports bras will help the atmosphere of Homecoming football games, but there has been no clear explanation from her or anyone who contributed to the institution of these rules. Administrators also refuse to comment on the subject, with both Dr. Montia Gardner and Associate Principal, Ms. Sarah Long, being reached out to with no response.

Hannah also comments on the fact the enforcement of this rule was done by female teachers. She says, “The fact that the school had them regulate the game tells me they purposely put females there instead of men, because if they had male teachers it would’ve been a huge problem. It gives me the insight that they knew this was going to be a problem from the start or knew there was something wrong with it.”

Williams comments on the strange enforcement of rules. She says, “It was weird how the teachers chose which bras were okay to wear without a jacket and which weren’t. I also don’t get how putting our jacket over the bra somehow makes it so much better. What’s the difference between my shoulders being shown or not?”

The senior sports bras controversy also contributes to the wider topic of regulating female dress in high school. Many female students at Central are happy with the school’s liberality regarding dress code, which allows for freedom of expression. The question of why the dress of senior girls is being regulated must be raised. Not only this, but the regulation of dress at an extracurricular is extremely backwards, especially with no explanation.

Senior sports bras also have a clear effect on the spirit of football games, as seen by Ava Borbely, a senior at Central. She comments on the scarcity of spectators and atmosphere of the second home football game on September 30. Borbely says, “had no crowd. Not having the senior sports bras made it so there was no tradition, so people thought it was pointless to go to the game. Nobody wanted to get yelled at the whole time.” Perhaps the atmosphere of this game reflects the effect that taking away this long standing tradition will have.