To not get schools issue with dyed hair?

[fitforflighting]

I suspect I may get flamed for this but I genuinely do not get it.
They have a rule against earrings including sleepers. That I get especially with younger children or in sports were children can end up getting them at worst ripped out.

I can kind of even get extreme haircuts with big shaved stars or strange styles that look unprofessional and might not be allowed by adults in a professional work place.

But this week and last term several of senior age children who had dyed hair brown/red/dark purple etc were sent home from school to re dye or put in isolation by teachers with errr brown/red/purple dyed hair! One of the children's teacher has bright purple hair. It does not make her any less of a English teacher or lesson her professionalism in school I don't reckon so what is the problem for teens?

But Cats, we start from the following position:

• The majority of parents want uniform and appearance rules.
• Thus schools have such rules.
• As a result, teachers enforce these rules as they do all others.

I'm not quite sure why you see it as the job of teachers (rather than e.g. governors, which is who parents could effectively lobby for change, or at least consultation on change) to relax the uniform? SMT ? Head / Governors, yes, if they wish to consult for and implement a change in policy. Classroom teachers? Less so.

Appalling English there, but I hope that the point was clear.

Ah, sorry Agony I was being sarcastic following pieceofpurple's post 13:47:07
I am endlesslessy surprised by the arrogance here.

Sorry, should have said those in charge of the school should relax the uniform policy.

England (and it is just England afaik - there is much less of an issue in Scotland at least; not sure about Wales) is really weird with this follow the rules uniform obsession. You don't see it in other European countries. You don't see it in most of the US. I don't think it's particularly useful either in terms of learning or school ethos (we lag very far behind other countries that don't have it in both of those areas) but still we persist with it. How many (wo)man hours of teachers' time is spent every year in enforcing something that has no actual proven benefit? How many hours a year of education is lost to children being sent home or kept in isolation because their socks were the wrong shade of black? Given that there is no pedagogical or social benefit to this strange obsession, it seems a great shame.

My own theory is that it's all bound up with social class and conformity and thus a rather knotty problem to unravel, but we do need to try and tackle it, because as long as we're focusing on what colour a child's hair is, that is time that is not being spent on focusing on that child's education and welfare.

My own theory is that it's all bound up with social class and conformity and thus a rather knotty problem to unravel, but we do need to try and tackle it, because as long as we're focusing on what colour a child's hair is, that is time that is not being spent on focusing on that child's education and welfare.

Well said

Felicity, arrogance? I endlessly surprised by your failure to acknowledge valid points that have been put forward and your attacks on the teaching profession.

I am going to say though, that as a teacher of many years, I do feel I have a higher level of expertise when it comes to explaining reasons for school rules and how students behave in classrooms than someone who isn't. Now, I didn't say that the reasons for rules were neccesarily right, but I have explained them.

All of those expecting teachers to lobby from the inside regarding a move to non-uniform (even though this in conflict with our contract of employment because we are required to uphold the school rules), are you all actively lobbying your own DCs' schools for such a change?

You can do so by contacting the governors, and there is absolutely no conflict at all in you doing so.

Ah felicity once again I don't agree with you so I must be arrogant.

I would not tell you how to do your job. You know what is best and what works. The post you are commenting on was in response to a pp who had told me I could not have good discipline because I did not do things the way they thought they should be done in schools. Not arrogance at all.

I have made no attacks on the teaching profession. None whatsoever.
It is unfair to say so.
Also, I do not think disagreeing with me is arrogant. I think saying things like
^people who "think" and teachers who "know" shows arrogance.
I am not telling anyone how to do their job.
I have voiced my opinion about rejecting or defending some rules.
Nowhere have I told anyone how to teach, nowhere.

In the US, faith-based schools are the bastion of uniform. These are all private schools. Many non-faith based private schools do not have a uniform.

In the few state schools that have a uniform, it really would more accurately be described as a more restrictive dress code (dark jeans might be allowed, colorful trainers allowed) certainly not a tie and blazer type get-up

Lurker is right, most parents do want uniform and enforcement. And I'm sure there's no will towards relaxing uniform from parents or from government.

Based on our experience, I think that the drive behind more and stricter uniform is based on totally fallacious reasoning, rooted in some kind of weird folk-memory that harks back to a fictional time in the past when all children were neatly dressed in blazers and caps, knew all their times tables and their place and gave up their seats to adults on the bus.

I think this because any time (every time, you can set your watch by it) the fact that you have a child at a non-uniform school comes up in conversation with other parents, you can guarantee that the conversation will go: "Oh, I love uniform, I'd never send my child to a non-uniform school because they'd get bullied for not having the latest designer wear/they'd spend hours deciding what to wear every morning and never get out of the house on time/children need something to rebel against, if it wasn't uniform they'd all be smoking and taking drugs". When you point out, mildly, that this is in fact not the daily experience of having a child in a non-uniform school, their eyes glaze over.

So there's a weird kind of self-fulfilling circular logic that goes, 'uniform is a good thing because we believe it's a good thing, therefore it must be good'. Of course it's bollocks, as witness the many many education systems (and a handful of brave establishments holding out against the tide in the UK) that don't have uniform and still manage to have orderly, rigorous schools producing well-qualified sensible school-leavers. And of course children who have grown up in a system based on uniform will be more than averagely likely to push the envelope when the rules are relaxed or abandoned for the day (witness the other common argument, "Oh, non-uniform day is a nightmare, I couldn't bear to go through that fuss every day", which completely ignores the fact that having a single random non-uniform day is in no way the same as not having a uniform at all).

I don't normally even bother trying to have the argument with people tbh, because it's pointless. Most people who argue for uniform have never experienced life without, so they have nothing to compare it with. Short of decreeing a compulsory RCT of splitting all UK schools into evenly-matched groups, making half of them abandon uniform, and then doing a 10year follow-up, nothing is going to change. Besides, I think parents secretly like having something to complain about.

But honestly, if you have the option of a no-uniform school, grab it with both hands, it's a revelation.

Good post agony

But Felicity, if you were an accountant and I were to say 'I think accountants do...in their workplace' and you reply 'No, I know that where I work that is not the case', that is completely reasonable, surely?

I am not an accountant, I have not been into your workplace, so I can only conjecture from other evidence and from indirect experience (e.g. DH is an accountant) and say what I 'think'. You DO 'know' what happens in your workplace.

Why is that different for teachers / school staff?

Cruik, you have basically repeated what I said earlier about it being a societal problem. The issue is how do we resolve it. Now as school policies are set following consultation with parents it the onus lies on parents to organise themselves and put the preassure on schools in order for them to change.

As a parent, I quite like it, my DD's quite liked it as it meant they didn't have to think about what to wear, DS well, DS ripped his trousers regularly playing football from aged 8-16.

DD1 who is now 21 said when she was in year 13 that it would be easier just to wear a uniform as it took her time to work out what to wear and she felt 6th form was a bit of a fashion parade (this said from a tall blonde girl who has a great figure so would look good wearing a rubbish bag).

teacher
That is not a fair analogy.
This has been a discussion about people, children, behaviour and expectations. I have not said that teachers do... Whatever in their workplace.
Or that they should do... Whatever in their workplace.
I have given my opinion about the usefulness, and fairness, or otherwise, of specific rules and their effect on behaviour. As a participant in society my view is as valid as anyone else's.
And it is unneccessary and a bit pissy for anyone to accuse me of attacking teachers.

Felicity,

But you said "I think saying things like
"people who "think" and teachers who "know" shows arrogance" - and this was in the context of what happens, or should happen, in the classroom, a teacher's workplace - and in the context of behaviour WITHIN THAT WORKPLACE. How is comparing this to a different workplace not a fair analogy?

Thanks Cats

Personally I couldn't give a toss about uniform, plenty of countries manage fine without it and I found enforcement of it tedious, but I don't feel I had any choice about doing as I was told.

I don't know what the answer is, sadly, lurker. I agree with Agony's point about it being a harking-back to some non-existent time, when children all behaved themselves and had respect for their elders and betters and that was because they wore a uniform. I also think it's to do with class ie if you force your child into some ridiculous impractical (and seriously, could there be anything more impractical than requiring a child to wear the same item of dry-clean only clothing that costs £60 every day) getup they look like they're going to Eton so that will automatically guarantee themselves a place at Oxford and a career in the City. As such, I think it's no coincidence that the popularity of ever-stricter uniform rules has coincided with social mobility slowing down over the past 30 years. That is, it has become less likely that a child from an average background will improve on the financial/societal standing they were born into, but at least if we make them look like 'one of them' then we're doing our bit to up their chances.

I agree with that, but until we have a societal change then schools will continue to have rules and enforce them. Teachers will have to enforce them as part of their contract etc.

So this discussion has reached the point of , this is the way it is, there is no solution put forward.

I will say here though, that one of the issues schools have is trying to keep all the stakeholders happy. Its not possible, but the bile and anger which comes on here toward people who are just doing their job is disgusting.

Oh also, have you noticed that since the posts explaining the law and how it works, Lord has disappeared? Quite funny really.

*A lot of the arguments on here are from non teachers who 'think' and teachers who 'know'.

As said previously I wouldn't tell you how I 'think' you should do your job as I would assume you 'know' how to do it.*

This was not specific to a scenario that only someone in the classroom would know about. and it came from a poster who had previously told another MNer that she obviously didn't know much about children.

and I repeat, as the accusation has not been retracted, that I have not attacked the teaching profession.

He isn't on the other thread he was hectoring people on either.

Well, there is a solution. We could all vote Corbyn at the next election and he could lead us forward into the great socialist new dawn (minus McDonnell, natch) and then parents wouldn't feel the need for straw boaters to compensate for the fact that hard work often only brings its own reward and not financial/societal parity.

Felicity my last answer was to you as you raised it - the original post was not. As I stated in the previous post it was aimed at a previous poster who declared me a poor disciplinarian ... not you.

Well, I voted labour last time naturally and will do so again, I think Corbyn is a dead duck to be honest, great levels of chat about him, but little action.