When I was a kid in the UK in the 50s/early 60s I wore a uniform at grammar school: blazer with school badge, cap, regulation trousers, shirt, shoes, etc. We all hated it then and envied the kids at the ordinary schools who didn’t have to wear one and made our life hell if they spotted us alone on the way home. Looking back though I think uniforms a good idea; they helped bring cohesion to the school, to establish an identity for us and to emphasize the traditions of the school.
In the UK uniforms are gradually making a comeback. I don’t know how common uniforms are in American schools but in general are school uniforms helpful in education, are they irrelevant, or are they harmful?
Another one of those things that has pluses and minuses to it, AND can be done well or done poorly.
The main positive, is that it prevents the common problem of distracting clothing competitions between the children, and makes them all equal in that aspect at least.
The main ways it can be done wrong, is to choose uniforms that make the children look terrible, and/or making them an excessively burdensome expense for the parents. As with all school-related costs, they should be paid for out of the same general fund that pays for the schools themselves. This assumes that these are public schools, of course.
School uniforms are an excellent way to establish order in classrooms. It models the social conformity children will encounter as adults. Just part of their education.
I went to a Catholic elementary school for 9 years. I wore a white shirt, a blue tie, navy blue pants, black Oxford shoes and a red blazer. After that, I went to a Catholic high school with minimal dress codes.
Today, I teach at an affluent public high school where most kids wear t-shirts, shorts and flip flops year round.
Do I have a strong opinion? Not really. I never minded wearing my uniform, and don’t mind being surrounded by kids in shorts today.
Occasionally, just occasionally, I think it would be nice if kids would take a little more pride in their appearance… but eventually, most of my students will go to college and get good jobs. They’ll have the rest of their lives to wear suits or business cazh.
Having done both, for many years, with multiple kids and schools, I’d say there is no downside to uniforms unless it turns into a vindictive harassment issue where kids are perpetually in trouble for an inch here and a shade there.
It simplifies life for everyone at a time when complexity reigns, and removes an entire volume of potential conflicts from the school day.
But I won’t claim it’s an absolutely universal good or a panacea. Just something with the potential for strong positives and a narrow range of avoidable negatives.
But you know… I went to an Ivy League school where practically everybody wore blue jeans to class. You couldn’t tell I was from a blue collar neighborhood becaus the rich kids all dressed as casually as I did.
Most of my students are well off, but none are wearing expensive threads that make poorer classmates feel bad. They ALL dress like they just rolled out of bed, or like they’re on their way to the beach!
I used to be a teacher, and I can’t say I ever wished for kids to be in uniform for any reason. When you teach a general subject and have lots of students, it makes them harder to tell apart, actually. But if one has a school where the fashion show becomes a real problem, having a uniform can address that issue. If that’s the situation, you could mandate jeans and white t-shirts, as I’ve read a few schools have done. But requiring kids to dress up in jackets and ties or other pseudo formal-wear is just silly.
And guess what - it’s silly when adults have to do it for jobs too. Our societal requirements for uniforms, both codified and traditional are really are absurd, IMHO.
Some job roles require people to be easily identified, so I have no problem with a uniform in those situations. I fly airplanes for a living, and the pilot needs to be identifiable in some circumstances. But the standard airline uniform is ridiculous and I hate it.
There’s no reason for neckties. Ever. Anywhere. They should go away.
Dress shoes are often uncomfortable. We should get over the need for “nice” shoes. I spend extra money to get comfortable shoes, but this shouldn’t be necessary.
White shirts are hard to keep clean. They’re pointless. JetBlue and Virgin are smart - they use colored shirts.
When I rant about this the occasional response invokes “respect”. If we don’t dress a certain way, people won’t take us seriously. I see this as a form over substance issue. I’ve known plenty of incompetent people (not in flying though) who were good dressers, thereby superficially masking the harm they caused. I also see police officers in hot climates wearing shorts as part of their uniform, and it doesn’t make me respect them any less. Bringing this back to the school situation, by putting so much importance on attire we give more power to a nonsensical norm. Making kids wear uniforms would indeed prepare them for a world in which you have to wear a suit to the office - and that’s a stupid tradition we should leave behind. I’ve worked in places with much more casual dress codes, and I think it works fine. I hereby volunteer the next time I hire a lawyer, doctor or whatever, it’s totally cool with me if they don’t wear a tie. They can even wear sneakers.
Should we generally dress neatly? Sure. If you have a job that requires identification, we should wear uniforms that are functional and not uncomfortable. But let’s get away from the misplaced emphasis on clothing. And for Og’s sake, let’s stop imposing it on kids.
Your argument seems to be mostly about the absurd end of things - jackets, ties, slacks, dress shoes. I completely concur.
But reasonably uniform shirts in one or two well-defined colors, and plain khakis or the like, is not excessive at any level. IMHO.
I agree heartily about ties. Ban them, burn them, bury them.
Shirts could be flexible as long as the definition is narrow - white, black, maybe a third well-defined color like navy or dark green or burgundy.
Shoes - the problem with allowing “comfortable shoes” is that you get into the whole this-week’s-Jordans $300 designer monstrosity problem. At the least, you have to limit shoes to black or white with minimal decoration or color variation. IMHO.
What a lot of public schools are calling “uniforms” are just really strict dress codes. I don’t personally have a problem with that, as long as girls are allowed to wear pants, and not required to wear skirts. Strict dress codes eliminate “judgment calls” on whether a T-shirt slogan is offensive, or whether someone is being too sensitive. You just require either polo shirts, or button-down shirts and blouses.
Dockers (or the generic thereof) can be plenty comfortable, and cost the same as jeans-- and you can find them at Goodwill, for that matter.
Uniforms may be part of the package when parents sign on for a private school, but I don’t think they belong in public schools, not uniforms with identifying crests and such, where you have to order them through the school, and either pay a lot, or apply for a fee reduction through a complicated process-- or scrounge used ones from garage sales.
But strict dress codes in public schools usually come in response to a problem, like people getting beat up for their shoes, or arguing over, and reporting other students for slogans on T-shirts. Or students wearing deliberately provocative clothing. I know I did that in high school, although it was more clowning than trying to anger people.