Colorado Student Banned from Yearbook Over Racy Photo

[ShowtimeSBMVP]

A Colorado teenager whose yearbook picture was rejected for being too revealing is vowing to fight the ban with her high school’s administration, but the editors of the yearbook insist it was their decision alone on the photo.
The five student editors of the Durango High School yearbook in Durango, Col., told the Durango Herald they were the ones who made the call not to publish a picture of senior Sydney Spies posing in a short yellow skirt midriff and shoulder-exposing black shawl as her senior portrait.

“We are an award-winning yearbook. We don’t want to diminish the quality with something that can be seen as unprofessional,” student Brian Jaramillo told the paper on Thursday.

Spies was joined by her mother, Miki Spies, and a handful of fellow Durango High students and alumni in a protest outside the school Wednesday after, she said, administrators informed her the photo would not be permitted because it violated dress code.

“I feel like they aren’t allowing me to have my freedom of expression,” Spies told the Herald. ”I think the administration is wrong in this situation, and I don’t want this to happen to other people.”

The five editors, who said their decision was unanimous, said Spies’ blame was misplaced, in both targeting the administration, and believing that it was a dress code issue.

They also offered her an opportunity to include the photo in the yearbook, just not as her senior photo.

“If she (Spies) chooses to, the picture will run as her senior ad, not her senior portrait,” Trujillo said.

Despite the clarification from her peers into how and why the decision was made, a meeting Spies initiated between herself, her mother, and the school’s principal, Diane Lashinsky, was held today as planned.

“The editors all turned their backs on me and changed their minds,” she told the Herald. “I really do feel like they were intimidated by the principal.”

Neither Spies nor the school responded to ABCNews.com‘s requests for comments today on the meeting’s outcome.

The Durango School District, which oversees the high school, issued the following statement to ABCNews.com

“The editors of Durango High School’s yearbook informed a senior student in December that her photo in question would not be included as a senior portrait in the yearbook and asked her to submit a replacement. Durango School District 9-R’s administration supports this decision.”

Prior to today’s meeting, the Spies family told local media they planned to meet with a civil lawyer in Denver to review their daughter’s case.



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[hometeam]

I'd smash

[talastan]

Originally Posted by lcarus

She can pay the attorney in....other....ways?

I wonder if it is too late to switch my degree to law?

[Predarat]

She is 18 and a definate yes!

[Skyy God]

The ACLU should take this important legal matter of sluts' rights pro bono.

[Pitt Gorilla]

Originally Posted by Pittsie

The ACLU should take this important legal matter of sluts' rights pro bono.

You said...

[Lumpy]

"Sluts don't have rights... sprayed!"

[Caseyguyrr]

[CHENZ A!]

Haha

[luv]

Originally Posted by pr_capone

That pic has no business being in a HS yearbook. This is a school yearbook... not glamor shots.

Agreed.

[loochy]

Originally Posted by luv

Agreed.

[luv]

Originally Posted by loochy

If that was your daughter, would you want that picture in a yearbook?

[loochy]

Originally Posted by luv

If that was your daughter, would you want that picture in a yearbook?

No, but it's not my daughter.

If you were a young man, wouldn't you want to gaze upon a very nice looking young woman?

[Stinger]

Originally Posted by luv

If that was your daughter, would you want that picture in a yearbook?

If that was my daughter those type of poses/outfit would not have been purchased. Deeper issues here.....

[Backwards Masking]

Originally Posted by luv

If that was your daughter, would you want that picture in a yearbook?

I would want my daughter to do Whatever Makes Her Happy. Isn't that what a good parent is Supposed To Do?

[Chief Roundup]

Originally Posted by Backwards Masking

I would want my daughter to do Whatever Makes Her Happy. Isn't that what a good parent is Supposed To Do?

Yes and No. Most teenagers think they know what they want and what will make them happy. But generally what they think is not the way things really are.