A hair color code is strictly enforced at almost half of all high schools operated by the metropolitan government in Tokyo.
Students who arrive after classes with wavy hair or locks that are not uniformly black must submit a document signed by their parents or guardians stating that this is their natural appearance.
The policy was adopted by more than 40 percent of such schools in the metropolitan area, according to the Japanese Communist Party members of the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly who questioned the edict.
The issue of school regulations covering hair color is one that has come before the courts and has sparked international interest in the rigid system that regulates Japanese schools to encourage compliance.
The JCP, observing that the case infringes on human rights, issued a request for information and was rewarded with a pile of documents transmitted by the Tokyo Metropolitan Board of Education.
Of the 177 metropolitan high schools for full-time students, 150, or 84.7 percent, had some form of hair regulation. Seventy-nine schools, or 44.6 percent of the total, asked students to submit documents signed and sealed by their parents confirming that they were born with a natural wave in their hair or a color other than black.
According to the documents, some schools even asked for photos of certain pupils when they attended the primary or junior high school to confirm the correctness of the details provided. In other cases, students were required to submit documents from their doctors supporting their claims about the natural condition of their hair.
Some schools invalidated the documents if the student even dyed his hair at one time or another or had a permanent one at a hair salon.
Some schools used a color scale so that students could rate their hair color.
Education council officials have insisted that the documents are necessary to avoid situations in which teachers reprimand students for their hair based on misperceptions.
They added that notices had been sent to individual schools asking them to explain to students and their parents that the submission of the documents was completely voluntary.
However, a study by the JCP bloc in the Tokyo Metropolitan Assembly found that only five high schools made a point of declaring this to be the case.
“Registering a student’s hair color is a human rights violation similar to the question of registering their skin color,” said one JCP member. “It is a natural right to have the hair with which the student was born, and it does not have to be approved by others.”