You’d be forgiven for laughing at a headline like that, but the reality—that an eight-year-old girl from Tennessee was sent home due to “foul odour”—is actually quite pitiful.
According to an article in the Digital Journal, the girl’s school reportedly sent her home dozens of times for being unbearably smelly. At first read I assumed the little girl had gastro problems, but it seems the issue is one of simple hygiene.
The girl’s mother, Krystal Hensley, claims the second-grader bathes every day and is a great student. The school begs to differ, though, claiming the child sleeps in the same clothes and when grilled, she couldn’t remember when she last had a bath.
Apparently the Department of Children Services has been involved in the past, but “a case was never opened.”
The school has made it clear that the girl cannot return to classes until the problem is resolved. Hensley was adamant that the odour had no medical cause.
Was this school within its rights to suspend the girl?
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