We've
all had at least one bad haircut in our lifetimes, and chances are, we remember how that bad haircut made us feel. Jason Smith, the middle school principal at Stonybrook Intermediate and Middle School in Indianapolis, Indiana, understood that feeling. And that's why it was a no-brainer to jump into action for one of his students, Anthony Moore.
Moore was wearing a hat, which is against the school's dress code. After the student spoke with a school dean for about 30 minutes, Smith was asked to step in.
"I sat across from him and asked, 'What's wrong? Why are you being defiant, why are you refusing to take your hat off? It's a pretty simple request,'" Smith said. "And he explained that his parents took him to get a haircut and he didn't like the results."
Smith said he and the dean thought his hair looked fine. "But you know he's a 13 [or] 14-year-old kid, and we know social acceptance is more important than adult acceptance," he said.
"I told him, 'Look, I've been cutting hair since I was your age,' and I showed him pictures of my son's haircuts that I did and some of me cutting hair in college. And I said, 'If I run home and get my clippers and fix your line, will you go back to class?'" Smith said. "He hesitated but then he said yes."
So in the snow, Smith drove back home to get his clippers and brought them to his office to line Moore's head up while his parents were called for consent to touch up his hair.
Tawanda Johnson, Moore's mom, said she thought the gesture was wonderful.
"He (Smith) handled it very well to keep him from getting in trouble at school," she said. "I'm just glad that he was able to handle that without ... being put in in-school suspension."
