My teenage boys finally got the health message I have being trying to get through to them for years regarding wearing a coat on cold wet days. During lunch time and recess, in the play ground, they decided to wear their coats to keep warm and dry. However the assistant principal informed them that their coats were not apart of school uniform and if they wore them again they would get a detention. Angry and shocked I wrote the assistant principal a note requesting my children wear a coat for health reasons. With the note in his hand and before discussing with me the heath reasons I had, he told them to take off their coats and that I had no say in the uniform policy. I can't believe Victorian public schools, that offer no warm dry areas for the children to play, would deny children the basic human right to stay warm and dry by telling them to remove their coats. Coats have no 'social value' in schools, in fact my children run the risk at being bullied for wearing one. What makes me more angry is on school excursions children are often told to wear a school uniform and a coat is a mandatory excessary, And why? To ensure children stay dry and warm, so why not extend this basic human right to Victorian children who live in cold wet climates? Teachers wear nice thick warm coats so why are they telling the children not to? I think as parents we need to start standing up to some of the education departments out dated policies, that put our children at risk.