To think these socks are absolutely fine for school???

[owlah]

DS is in year 7 and needs grey socks for school. Boys have to wear trousers.

The bit of these that you can see are grey, only the toes and heel and very top are purple... The only reason it was spotted is because he hurt his foot on the stairs and took his shoe off when seeing school medical person, she ticked his uniform card for having incorrect uniform...

AIBU for thinking it's ridiculous?

Ridiculous. Theyre clearly appropriate grey socks.
And i say this as someone who is tough on uniform with my own students.

People asking about policing bras. Yes. If have a word with a girl chosing to wear bright bras under white shirts just like Id tell a male student wearing trousers so their boxers can be seen that I dont want to see it. No need to see underwear in the workplace.

They look fine to me. But then I am probably the wrong person to ask, as I allow DS to wear jazzy pants and socks under uniform - he has never had plain socks regardless of the uniform rules, but has only ever been moaned at once when he was in year 8. As long as his trousers and shoes are right, what difference does a sock make?

Uniform card? House? Is this a private school?

Ffs round here the kids have the loosest interpretation of uniform possible and get away with murder. They do look scruffy but go on to get good grades and uni places, so perhaps the colour of their socks doesn't affect their ability to learn! DS wears whatever socks he can find, usually odd ones and might wear one red and one yellow.
His black school trousers split last week and he has been wearing navy chinos ever since until I can get time to take him shopping,and no-one had batted an eyelid.

1. Ridiculous sock sanction is ridiculous.

1. I suspect I may know @WorshipTheGourd. Unless "nonsense on stilts" has caught on in a bigger way than Bentham expected. Which would actually be even more pleasing in some ways. The idea of it being A Thing for lots of people. But still. That was slightly discombobulating.

Oh, I'm not going to go stalking WorshipTheGourd's post's as if it IS someone I know that's a bit off really. So shall have to contain my little soul in patience & see if they wish to enlighten me. Ho-hum.

Then why bother having any rules in the first place if its so friggin good to break them... Never will I understand. Its a really easy rule to keep and by arguing it you are saying well noir all rules need to be kept, then the child will remember this, good luck the next rule you try and instill!

Just having a whole raft of rules covering everything from the minutia to the serious is no substitute for teaching empathy and respect. Is it more important to just say do not steal or kill because it is a rule? Or is it better to get someone to engage more and discuss the impact of stealing on the victim? What the knock on effects are for them and how it now makes their possibly already bleak lives that much harder. Along with the wider impact death in such a violent manner has on, not only the victims family but the person responsible.
Is it more important to just say these are the rules and these are the punishments for breaking them without going into what may drive a person to break those rules? You can seek to understand the motivation behind a person's actions without condoning said actions.
It is, I would argue more important to have the subjects of such rules understand the full scope of why they are being imposed than to just blindly follow them. Blind obedience, I would argue leads more into breaking rules, as there are that many of them they all seem the same without any understanding of what's behind them. Therefore someone with a lack of understanding why is more likely to not think through the action and consequence of breaking rules.
It's a ridiculously simplistic view to say this is akin to saying rules don't matter. What many of us on the thread are doing is asking is this a productive rule? What are the benefits of such a rule and is it one that should have zero tolerance or some degree of flexibility?
Encouraging a blind obedience to rules without question leads directly to an abdication of personal responsibility and thought.
We used to have the death penalty and ship offenders to penal colonies for various crimes. If everyone blindly followed rules then it would never have been questioned as to whether these were still fit for purpose as a punishment.

Uniform card? House? Is this a private school?

My betting is it's an academy. They have a track record of focussing on uniform because it's easy and plays well to the right wing press. Never mind that it's an awful lot of time wasted at the expense of putting in place sustainable improvements that actually benefit children.

My DD goes to bog standard supposedly outstanding but not in my book it's not secondary and they have all those things. Along with the total and utter obsession with uniform minutiae

My two are at a State Middle School with a Uniform Card and House.
Ds (history of school refusal due to anxiety, asd and dyslexia) was given a stamp in his uniform card in his 1st half term for wearing the wrong colour PE socks. Which had been purchased from School stores the week before.

Truly 'nonsense on stilts'. I also use 'silly-billy' a lot. Does that ring any bells, ZebraOwl (not sure to which Bentham you refer however?)

OopsDearyMe
I agree, if you have rules then it is important to try to enforce them (otherwise tremendous waste of time / energy and cant enforce others. I just think you should only have rules that are worth having, and to fuss over the colour of a piece of underwear that cant be seen is so far from relevant to decent education that it is a rule not worth making or keeping)

Tell the school that that the socks are designed like that on purpose. To fulfil a grey sock uniform policy but also so the household can tell the difference between each other's socks.

Our academy tried to introduce regulation underwear. Oh how I laughed! And then ignored them, just like everyone else did.

It does seem pretty stupid.

@Dillite2

What was it? It sounds absolutely mad and entirely unenforceable.

What on earth Dillite!

Tell the school that that the socks are designed like that on purpose. To fulfil a grey sock uniform policy but also so the household can tell the difference between each other's socks.

That sounds way to sensible, Datun!

If my children's school introduced regulation underwear, I think I'd be raising a stink with the governors, Ofsted and the LA's safeguarding team. It would be entirely reasonable to point out that, if they're going to have uniform rules like this, they are presumably going to check, and that it would be completely inappropriate to have adults checking children's underwear regularly. Frankly, it would make me have very serious doubts about the proclivities of whoever thought up the idea and those who endorsed it.

They wanted to have green knickers/ vests, as that's the colour of the school. The first I found out about it was when my DD came home from school with a note saying that she lost house points because she didn't have regulation underwear on. So the next day I went in to find out more, and yes, apparently when the new uniform was introduced the new underwear was also (only they forgot to list it on the uniform list) and that the head was in the process of cracking down. So I told them that unless they decide to provide me with that underwear my child will be going in wearing what she has always worn and if they don't like it then they are welcome to send her home. Apparently in the last 2 years that the head has been running the school she has gone very power hungry. After all, she has improved the school's achievements by 13.5%.

How on earth was that checked?! The woman is barking!

Maybe when changing for PE or doing cartwheels?

Yes, sorry, it was a PE day. Hey, it's all in tbe name of raising standards and encouraging children to take pride in their school.

Bonkers. I'm glad she gave it up

Wow! Makes me glad our school doesn't have uniforms, thats so strict re: socks. X