School uniforms

[ICTChris]

During a debate on the Education Bill in the House of Lords, the Earl of Clancarty caused a stir by suggesting that school uniforms were repressive, that they should be abolished and that we should allow schoolchildren to “find their own style”. Many people opposed the right honourable saying that uniforms prevent the bullying of children whose families can’t afford expensive and fashionable clothes.

 

Here’s the story, apologies for the Daily Mail link - https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9381999/amp/Ministers-told-traditional-uniform-repressive-abolished.html?__twitter_impression=true

 

Do P&Bers agree with the Earl of Clancarty?

What were P&Bers experiences of school uniforms?

[101]

They should be free and standardised if they are truly to stop bullying and make a level playing field then it should be equity for all with a choice from a catalogue and stock in the school.

I remember kids coming in with holes in their shoes and wet feet, utterly depressing looking back.

[Gordon EF]

Maybe if we want to stop kids being bullied in school for being poor, we should do something about the amount of child poverty in the country. Just an idea.

[Karpaty Lviv]

I remember my high school blazer costing about £35-£40. It was a simple black blazer with the badge glued on very poorly and would fall off constantly. That was when they started to become compulsory (or rather the head teacher made it so, he would constantly be on everyone’s case to wear them). This was around 2004-2009. 

Primary school stuff was from a shop called Baru in Kirkintilloch. They supplied quite a few schools with kit. 

 

[Nutz_the_Squirrel]

15 minutes ago, 101 said:

They should be free and standardised if they are truly to stop bullying and make a level playing field then it should be equity for all with a choice from a catalogue and stock in the school.

I remember kids coming in with holes in their shoes and wet feet, utterly depressing looking back.

 

11 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

Maybe if we want to stop kids being bullied in school for being poor, we should do something about the amount of child poverty in the country. Just an idea.

Good points. The idea that school uniform is a leveller in respect of family incomes, or is cheaper than other clothes is a fallacy. 

[Rob1885]

They should stay and they should be heavily, heavily subsidised imo.

[Venti]

Hated the fact my primary tie was black & white.

[Jim McLean's Ghost]

17 minutes ago, Nutz_the_Squirrel said:

 

Good points. The idea that school uniform is a leveller in respect of family incomes, or is cheaper than other clothes is a fallacy. 

School uniforms are cheaper than other clothes. Not everything but kids are arseholes and given the chance will make it a fashion parade.

I don't dismiss the idea that they are oppressive though. I think there should be a wider variety of choice in uniform. Shirt and tie should not be the only option. And I don't think uniform is the only way kids can express themselves. I don't buy into any pish about banning dyed hair and things like that.

[Miguel Sanchez]

Never did me any harm.

[velo army]

Aye we had uniform. no blazers, thankfully, but it won't stop the pisstaking about clothes. If your shoes had two stripes instead of three, if your bag or jacket weren't one of the more acceptable brands it was fair game for a slagging. That combined with having a dinner ticket would mark you out. 

I'm not surprised the Daily Mail have looked at children being bullied/slagged for being poor and their solution is to just make pupils wear the same clothes. It's an act of denial. It's like looking at homelessness and saying that the solution to that is to ban begging. All it does is to remove the optics of the problem from those who aren't disadvantaged by it. Poor kids who wear school uniform will still be dealing with the consequences of their relative poverty when they go home, or when they can't go on the same trip as their classmates.

In saying all that I looked smart as f**k in  my uniform. 

[Nutz_the_Squirrel]

19 minutes ago, Jim McLean's Ghost said:

School uniforms are cheaper than other clothes. 

No they aren’t. Beyond it means there’s less money to buy non school clothes which causes a lot of problems for families experiencing significant poverty. 

[invergowrie arab]

My secondary school blazer was over a hundred quid in 1995.

The three colour braiding apparently 

[itzdrk]

Personally speaking I found it regressive, especially in secondary school where our school colours were a very bright purple and gold, it encouraged finding what the bare minimum was to get away with, something I've carried into office work.  Wouldn't know whether that's an argument for it being stricter or being scraped though! 

[David W]

My secondary school didn't have uniform, I wore various jeans and hoodies (which had a pouch for my CD player) for 6 years. I didn't know how to tie a tie until I was about 22. There's probably a connection there.

[itzdrk]

1 minute ago, David W said:

My secondary school didn't have uniform, I wore various jeans and hoodies (which had a pouch for my CD player) for 6 years. I didn't know how to tie a tie until I was about 22. There's probably a connection there.

I still do not, I am over 30. 

[DA Baracus]

School uniforms are a load of pish. Get them binned. Some kids will be dicks and that's just an unfortunate fact, uniform or not. 

I hated school uniforms. At primary I got away with a t-shirt and black Fruit of the Loom sweatshirt on top and black joggers with trainers bottom.

In high school I believe I started out with the usual grey/black trousers and a shirt (a fucking shirt!). I might even have worn a tie (a fucking tie!). I actually wore shoes (fucking shoes!).

However I quickly was able to get away with a polo shirt under a plain black jumper, and got away with black trainers. I think the school tried a few times to be a bit more strict but it never really worked. By 5th year I was rocking a t-shirt instead of polo shirt but I had, for some utterly unfathomable reason, switched to a baggy white Mizuno sweatshirt. The f**k was I thinking?! No bullying for me though, although I wish a pal had a word about that sweatshirt! All prefects had to wear blazers mind. Luckily I was not a prefect.

[tamthebam]

1 hour ago, Slenderman said:

Hated the fact my primary tie was black & white.

Our school colours were maroon and white..

We had to wear shorts up to Primary 7. Your legs were bloody freezing in winter.

[Shotgun]

I remember my Dad saying that my school blazer cost more than the most expensive suit he owned. And of course, I  needed a new one almost every year. 

Then my mum discovered a gents outfitters a couple of towns over that sold jackets that were ‘almost’ the same colour for a fraction of the price. I didn’t get any crap about that, no sirree. 

Poor kids wore hand-me-downs or threadbare efforts that they’d long grown out of. 

Worst of all though, it marked you out as being from the Grammar School rather than the Secondary Modern. Some of the kids from the other school could be quite unkind. 

[Gaz]

There's no legal requirement for pupils to wear a uniform in Scotland.

An oft-overlooked benefit of them, however, is that it's relatively easy to see quickly if someone is in the school grounds who shouldn't be.

[tamthebam]

2 minutes ago, Gaz said:

There's no legal requirement for pupils to wear a uniform in Scotland.

An oft-overlooked benefit of them, however, is that it's relatively easy to see quickly if someone is in the school grounds who shouldn't be.

Unless it's Angus Young looking for Panini swaps