news-record.com

Guilford County Schools officials are leaving it up to principals to enforce dress code rules among students who choose to participate in Black Thursday.



Civil rights activists have asked people across the country to wear black in support of six black teenagers in Jena, La., who were initially charged with attempted murder in the beating of a white classmate.



The six teens were charged not long after the local prosecutor declined to charge three white high school students who hung nooses in a tree on their high school grounds. Five of the black teens were initially charged with attempted murder, but that charge was reduced to battery for all but one, who has yet to be arraigned; the sixth teen was charged as a juvenile.



Spokesman Chad Campbell said Guilford school officials have heard conflicting reports from parents and the media about the districts position on the event. The district released a statement today saying: Contrary to reports being made, Guilford County Schools has not taken a position on the national movement, Black Thursday, in support of the Jena Six. It is the districts position that if a school has a standard mode of dress (SMOD) and black is not an approved color, principals exercise leniency today in not taking disciplinary action with students who do not comply with SMOD.



Campbell said he was not aware of any students in schools wearing black.



Were just trying to be proactive, he said.