The principal of Lafayette’s Angevine Middle School is asking parents to discourage their children from wearing colored jelly bracelets to school because of rumors that they carry sexual meanings.
“Reports indicate that the colors of the bracelets signify different inappropriate actions that students will do or have done,” principal Mike Medina wrote in an e-mail to parents Thursday.
“Due to the nature of the inappropriateness associated with these bracelets, we are asking students not to wear them.”
Some Angevine students have been wearing the rubbery bracelets since school started, Medina said, but with more and more children showing up with their wrists covered in the bright bands, school officials said they were becoming a “substantial distraction to the learning environment.”
Medina said he and his staff talked with some of the kids about the trend and learned about a hidden meaning.
“If they’re a distraction — especially if they may have some significance associated with inappropriate sexual activity — parents don’t want that, and we’re just being proactive,” Medina said.
For years, teens have been playing a jelly bracelet-related game called “snap,” in which boys try to break bracelets off the wrists of girls, according to sex-bracelet websites.
Different colors represent different sexual acts, and — if the bracelet breaks — rumor has it that girls are supposed to do what the bracelet says.
Medina said his staff is treating the bracelets like any other dress-code no-no and encouraging kids to take them off until after school. Some students have been asked to remove the bracelets, Medina said, but no one has been suspended for wearing them. He said he would be surprised if that happens.
“We’ve appealed to parents to work with kids to make wise choices and come to school prepared to learn,” he said.
“Parents are really good about encouraging students to dress appropriately. They’re very responsive when we appeal to them about doing the right thing.”
