A SCHOOLGIRL has been suspended on her first day back over her dyed red hair and false eyelashes.
April Harding says 14-year-old daughter Ella is being denied an education.
The teenager – who is going into Year 10 – was sent home from Oakgrove School in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, within an hour of arriving on Thursday.
She was told her new look was against the academy’s uniform policy.
It is not the first time Ella has been suspended from lessons.
Last year she spent an estimated 40 per cent of the time either in isolation or at home due to similar “violations”.
However, April is urging people to understand that Ella’s look was not simply an act of defiance from a teenager.
She said that in fact, there was a heartbreaking reason behind her fashion choices.
“She has complex mental health problems, many centred around the way she looks,” April told the MKCitizen.
“She pulls her eyelashes out as a form of self-harm, so she has no natural lashes at all – they are non-existent.”
Ella’s self esteem is so low that she detests her natural mousey blonde hair and refuses to leave the house unless it is dyed red.
“That’s the colour that makes her feel comfortable. She’s dyed it red for the past two years,” said April.
She said Ella “would rather be dead” than be seen without her hair dyed red.
Ella receives help and support from a council social worker, who has explained the position to the school.
April has also spent “countless hours” trying to negotiate with school officials each time her daughter is punished.
She described her daughter as “a solitary, introverted girl and is never disruptive”.
She added the rest of her uniform is perfect and the school is simply punishing her “because of the way she looks” and is “denying my daughter an education”.
Ella returned home sobbing, said April. She already suffers from an eating disorder, and each time she is punished she refuses to consume any food.
The Sun has approached Oakgrove for comment.
