ABILENE, Texas (KTAB/KRBC) – A group of Abilene High School students is upset after the school asked several boys to change out of women’s clothing they were wearing to support their friend.

These boys claim their friend wanted to wear a dress on the last day of school to express himself, so they decided to wear dresses as well so he wouldn’t feel uncomfortable.

They also wanted to wear the dresses to let other friends and family members know that it’s okay to be yourself, according to a spokesperson for the group.

The students say they were approached by school officials and told to change or they would receive ‘zeros’ for their final exam scores.

We reached out to Philip Ashby the Public Information Officer for AISD, and he had this to say:

“When Mrs. Raney, the principal, talked to one of the students, he was told that he could wear a dress as long as it was in compliance with the dress code and did not create a disruption to the school day. Mrs. Raney said there have been previous occasions when males came to school in a dress without incident. I am not aware if any of the boys chose to put their dresses back on.”

They are sharing their story on social media sites. One of the students involved is circulating a picture of him and his friends in dresses along with the following message:

“Where in the student code conduct does it say boys can’t wear women’s clothing? Girls can wear men’s clothing though? Nothing wrong with the way they came to school. We have equal rights, don’t we? AHS had no right to make them change.”

BigCountryHomepage has reached out to Abilene ISD for a statement on this issue. No response was received as of 12:00 p.m. This script will be updated as soon as the statement is released.

Abilene ISD’s full dress code policy can be found by following THIS LINK.