Just read the bloody uniform policy!!!

Personally I think all uniform is shit and a way of controlling kids and stamping on their creativity and sense of self. It is not an equaliser because they still have coats, shoes, bags etc that can be cheap or branded. The working world is different to it used to be and not many people wear business dress any more. Children in Europe and the US don’t seem to explode because they don’t wear uniforms.

I would have liked a choice to send mine to a non uniform school, but these don’t seem to exist. Luckily ds is about to start college, so no more uniform! Hurrah! I was so pleased I never had to wash any of those crap shirts or naff polyester sweatshirts ever again!

It shouldn't be their policy or be on their website. It shouldn't be any of the teacher's business whether girls wear ballet flats or not. Ditto skinny trousers v sensible trousers. Just teach the kids!

I am usually very supportive of uniform policy, but I am fucking livid at the new rules at our school. Sixth form, so mufti - no bare shoulders. Too distracting. Today a girl was told to go home and change as her bra strap was visible THROUGH THE FABRIC of the back of her shirt.

Meanwhile, these poor distractable boys are taking their bloody shirts off, with their nip's out, to play football.

What the actual fuck?

What about workers in supermarkets who have to wear a uniform. Do you disagree with there uniform policy.

Nonsense.

They'd be (and is) bullying over other matters. There's showing off with school accessories and other belongings and showing off about where you go outside of school. Children can still tell that some of them are a lot richer than others and they can find themselves other children who they think make good targets on one basis or another. If they're wearing the same usually poor quality uniform clothing, that doesn't do away with everything else.

Most of us in the real world of work don't have a set uniform. The school uniform is not a young person's version of the adult's experience in dressing for work.

Why do you defend their right to enforce a policy you don’t agree with? These policies demonise children for things broadly beyond their control, and often lead to extraordinary punitive measures that should have no place in modern society. We have to challenge these policies, not defend them!

Teachers should concentrate on teaching and let parents worry about clothing their kids.

As long as kids are clean, smart and wearing the correct items and colour scheme that should be all teachers need to fret about. Honestly I'd be embarrassed if I was a teacher telling kids they can't wear shoes with a logo

While I disagree with the strict uniform policies in the first place, I absolutely defend the school's right to enforce it. The policy will have been put on the website, emailed out, given to the incoming year 7 as transition etc.

Yet again, you are missing the point, possibly deliberately. If you don't have uniform rules, the active girls who want to play games won't turn up in ballet flats. If they're wearing ballet flats due to peer pressure or something similar, it will be that same peer pressure that deters them from playing games, not their shoes.

Allowing a choice of shoes doesn't impose anything on girls. Making boys wear sensible shoes does not encourage them out of idleness if they want to be idle.

There's also quite major prejudice in describing a disinclination to play playground games as idleness. If any child wants to spend their playtime reading, they are no more or less idle than the child who wants to kick balls around.

Have you tried Ricosta shoes? The are orthopaedic, waterproof and seems to last whole school year and beyond / can be passed down.

More fool them!

if a child "can't live without branded shoes" someone has messed up their parenting.

Nothing stopping them getting changed into school shoes when they get there. They can leave their trainers in a locker. Thata what we done back in the day.

If a child feels he can't live without branded shoes, the chances are that the unfortunate parent ends up forking out for those plus a separate pair for school. It doesn't do them any favours.

Then I would spend the money on the school shoes and buy cheaper trainers.

Also expensive trainers doesn't necessarily mean good quality.

Agreed. I don’t agree with the principle of ‘learning and sticking to rules’ if the rules themselves are stupid.

If a school can only teach about sticking to the rules by making a fuss about shoes, it is seriously failing as a school. The simple answer is not to have uniform rules beyond a requirement that children don't take the piss.

You’ll probably find the Nike shoes will last far longer than a cheap £10-20 supermarket shoe. And can be worn out of school as well.

You only think that piercings are only for ears because that's what you've been culturally conditioned to believe. You even acknowledge that other cultures disagree with you! Within the UK, people also disagree with you, why is this hard to comprehend?

Unlike gravitational attraction and the speed of light, appropriate piercing locations aren't one of the immutable laws of the universe. They are a matter of culturally-influenced opinion.

YANBU for having an opinion about where you are happy to pierce your body. YABU for wanting to impose that opinion on others and YABVVU in threatening your children with abusive criminal violence for wanting to pierce their bodies as they like.

Why are you talking to me like i’m making stuff up? The consultant literally told me i would need to take the existing insole out, and i’ve tried. I cannot get my son’s feet into shoes with both insoles in. His insoles are a good 1.5cm thick.

Children need to know that there are rules to follow if life. You can't just turn up to work and do as you please - you get fired.

And this. I work for local government and can wear pretty much anything.

That’s another thing. When they’re walking miles to school they need trainers

LOL at people pontificating about how brogues encourage children to be active.

Do you all go jogging in brogues?

THIS! The number of schools that insist on wanky ludicrously expensive uniform with hideous logos on is ridiculous, and they're virtually all academies who find it easier to enforce rigid uniform rules than to put in place effective teaching and learning.

They always bang on about the importance of children learning to keep to the rules, yet never seem to work out that ignoring the DfE guidance themselves isn't exactly setting the best example.

If ever I need PR, I'm going to find the people who put this out. It's such bollocks and doesn't go towards protecting kids from being singled out in any way at all.