Muslim athlete disqualified over uniform
 

Muslim athlete disqualified over uniform Wed Jan 16, 5:04 PM ET

A high school track star has been disqualified from a meet because officials said the custom-made outfit she wears to conform to her Muslim faith violated competition rules.

Juashaunna Kelly, a senior at the District of Columbia's Theodore Roosevelt High School, has the fastest mile and 2-mile times of any girl runner in the city this winter. She was disqualified from Saturday's Montgomery Invitational indoor track and field meet.

Kelly was wearing the same uniform she has worn for three seasons while running for Theodore Roosevelt's cross-country and track teams. The custom-made, one-piece blue and orange unitard covers her head, arms, torso and legs. Over the unitard, she wears the same orange and blue T-shirt and shorts as her teammates.

The outfit allows her to compete while adhering to her Muslim faith, which forbids displaying any skin other than her face and hands.

"It's not special," Kelly said. "It doesn't make me perform better."

But meet director Tom Rogers said Kelly's uniform violated rules of the National Federation of State High School Associations, which sanctioned the event. Uniforms are required to be "a single-solid color and unadorned, except for a single school name or insignia no more than 2 1/4 inches," he said.

Rogers said that he knew Kelly was wearing the uniform for religious reasons and that he offered her several options to conform to the rules while still respecting her faith, including placing a plain T-shirt over her unitard and then wearing her team uniform over it.

Kelly's mother, Sarah, and Roosevelt Coach Tony Bowden disputed that account. They said officials made several demands of her daughter before Rogers made his decision.

"First, they said she had to take her hood off," Sarah Kelly said. "Then, they said she can't have anything with logos displayed. Then, they said she had to turn it inside out. When I told them that there weren't any logos on it, they said she had to put a plain white T-shirt on over it."

Juashaunna Kelly has worn the same uniform for three years without any problems, including at last year's Montgomery Invitational. Rogers said officials must have missed the uniform last year.

"It wasn't a problem last year, and it's a problem this year? Make me understand why," Bowden said.

Kelly, whose 1,600-meter time of 5 minutes 17.49 seconds and 3,200-meter time of 12:00.81 are the fastest of any D.C. girl, was hoping to run fast enough at the Montgomery Invitational to qualify for the New Balance Collegiate Invitational in New York on Feb. 8-9.

Bowden said the team has no other meets scheduled that would allow her to qualify for the event, which attracts dozens of college recruiters.

Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

I don't think that's right. I don't know if they still do but back in the day the schools allowed girls to wear skirts over their gym shorts for relegious purposes. Of course that was before separation of church and state became prevalent.

anyone have a good picture they can post of it?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080116/...uslim_clothing

http://i46.photobucket.com/albums/f108/rgcraig/mus.jpg

I guess what makes me uncomfortable about the situation is: it's another way Islamic beliefs are influencing our schools. It's really not about modesty, it's about giving their beliefs special allowances.

This story only draws more attention to Muslims--

I also think this is a sign of how drastically the face of America HAS changed, is not that it IS changing...it already HAS.

Watch them next say we no longer can exclude our youth from an activity.

- Like having homeosexual awareness sessions

I don't see her story as any different than if we were posting about a UPC boy wanting to wear long pants and long-sleeved shirts as opposed to shorts and a T-shirt in competition. I also didn't see anything in that story that indicated that Islamic beliefs are influencing schools. This is about a Muslim girl and her beliefs alone from what I read.

The UPC expects their children (and adults as well) to get special allowances when it comes to their dress. I got special allowances all the time in school. I don't see the Muslims being any different.

The United States are not a christian country anymore.

The more I learn about history, the more I doubt we were ever a Christian country. :(

Thus Jeanies legitemate concern....

Actually it was never really a Christian nation, though there was a time Christians were the majority religion and a lot more people went to church....we now have a growing Muslim population and if anyone wants to see the end result look what happened to Lebanon and what is happening right now in Britain.