A mum has hit out at her daughter's school after it confiscated a seemingly innocent drawing it deemed 'inappropriate' and threatened to write her kid up for it.
She explains why the drawing prompted all the fuss below:
Sierra Carter, a Michigan resident, has had a falling out with her daughter's school Hanover-Horton Elementary School all over a drawing her daughter did.
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Taking to TikTok, the mum decided to share the situation to her thousands of followers.
Sierra captioned the post: "I can’t make this crap up."
The mum claimed that the whole ordeal began when she received a call from her 11-year-old daughter's school.
"Her teacher told me that my daughter had drawn something inappropriate in art class," Sierra began.
The teacher explained to the mum that a fellow classmate had noticed something slightly different about the 11-year-old's drawing of a pig.
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She said: "A little boy had come up to her and made her aware that he thought my daughter drew ‘boy parts’ on her pig project.
"So, she went over and asked my daughter for all of her papers, to which my daughter kind of nervously laughed."
Highlighting the particular detail, Sierra explained that her daughter told the teacher 'right away' that she drew a 'bow tie'.
Following this, the teacher then told Sierra's daughter that the principal would be getting involved in the situation.
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She said: "The teacher proceeded to take all of her papers from her and said she had to give my daughter’s project to the vice principal at the school to handle."
Coming into the school to 'address' the issue, Sierra was handed her daughter's drawing.
She said: "As soon as I look at it, I'm like 'are you fricking kidding me?'
"I literally slammed my hand down on the table.
"Like, why are we sitting here right now and why was there a big deal made out of this?
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"It’s a fricking bow tie," she added.
The mum then explained that the principal's first thoughts on the matter were to 'write up' the 11-year-old.
Upon chatting with him, Sierra revealed that the principal thought the drawing was something more than just a bow tie.
Sierra claimed he said: "A bow tie is a bow."
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"I'm sorry that my daughter is no Monet," the mother responded, "but to her, a bow tie is a bow and a tie."
She continued: "And if another kid happened to look at it and think that it was something else - that sounds more like a he problem, not a she problem."
While the principal decided not to give the child a write up, he did put her artwork into a 'folder' in case of any similar 'future instances'.
"My daughter has never been inappropriate, she has never even talked about ‘boy parts’ or ‘girl parts’," the mother concluded.
Speaking about the incident, John Denney, superintendent of the Hanover-Horton Schools, told Today:
"It is unfortunate that a one-sided narrative has been created on social media that paints our staff in a negative light."
He added that staff handled the situation with 'compassion' and 'discretion' while stating that no student was 'singled out'.
He also added that: "Nothing has been placed in any student’s school records related to this matter.
"Every effort was made to protect the privacy and dignity of all students."
Amassing more than 819.k views, 80.9k likes and dozens of thousands of comments - it's clear that people were eager to share their views on the matter.
On TikTok user commented: "I’d tell them I was mad that they sexualised my child’s drawing off of what a young boy said. They should be ashamed."
"Since when are 'boy parts' at the neck!? I’d be meeting with the superintendent," said another outraged person.
Also picking up on the bow tie's placement, a third wrote: "Its a bow tie! Something else would’ve been a little bit lower don’t you think?"
"Glad you stood up for your daughter," offered a final TikTok user. "That’s 100 percent a bow tie and she is so innocent. Sad this happened."
LADbible have contacted Hanover-Horton Elementary School for further comment.
Rhiannon Ingle