to think that schoolchildren should not have to wear a sign saying they have 24hrs to get their uniform sorted?

[orlantina]

www.theguardian.com/education/2017/jul/17/school-makes-pupils-wear-signs-if-uniform-doesnt-meet-standards

The idea being that by wearing a sign, it makes teachers aware that the pupil is aware of the issue and is going to get it sorted.

But I think that wearing a sign just also highlights issues and makes the pupils a potential target.

There are loads of reasons why a uniform might not be up to scratch in the morning. Not all of them are under the pupils' control.

Are there schools that don't allow coats on the way to school and teachers who drive round looking for kids not wearing blazers? I'm a bit dubious that that actually happens. Especially the teachers driving round thing.

I'm not saying that rules are always right and should not be questioned. I'm saying that in the context of a school having a uniform and wanting to enforce that uniform, it seems hard to argue that there's a huge unacceptable difference between a kid having a card and producing it multiple times per day to teachers, and that card being on a lanyard.

noble I'm pretty sure that is not the take away from uniform threads on here at all. It might be your take away.

Mine is that most people in favour of uniforms have never actually experienced a non uniform system and are, as Giles says, basing their opinion on Mufti days, which is a bit like only allowing a child chocolate once a year and then concluding from the fact they stuff themselves til they vomit that if they were allowed chocolate every day they would do the same thing every day.

I swallowed the "equaliser", "easier in the mornings", "sense of identity" and maybe even "school pride" arguments whole when I was a teacher in the UK - I even remember using uniform as a Year 7 class debate topic and year after year engineering the debate to ensure they came to the conclusion they actually should wear uniform like a good little representative of the school

However having moved to a country where school uniforms are very rare (there are no schools with uniforms anywhere even vaguely local) I have changed my mind totally. The arguments against uniform are utter hypothetical nonsense dreamt up by people who have never actually paid any attention to how schools in Europe run without uniform.

All my kids wear trainers to school unless they wear flip flops They wear jeans, in summer they wear shorts. They wear any colour they want. DD has purple streaks in her hair. DS1 wears a neon orange head band. In winter they wear neon jackets (with reflectors right up to secondary age) that are more easily seen when they walk to the bus stop. None of the predicted terrible consequences of not wearing uniform have ever happened, at all...

The only thing we've clashed heads over is DC1's wish not to use a proper structured school rucksack when carrying her heavy books to school any more... that argument could have happened in the UK too!

I think it make a a.mockery of the whole thing though. I mean the the lanyard itself is surely more of a potential disruption than the infringements it's being issued for?

Which means the only real purpose it has is to humiliate/draw attention to the pupils

the only real purpose it has is to humiliate/draw attention to the pupils

Or to save teacher time having to ask to see the card that is usually issued in these scenarios, which seems far more likely, tbh.

Here's a novel idea - just chucking it out there to see what people think (I can guess already who will disagree).
How about having a recommended uniform, but making it optional. Like that, if they want to show school spirit by nice well behaved children wearing school uniform, they can make the children proud of being at that school and wanting to show it off by wearing the uniform. The ones that aren't proud of it can show their rebellion (for what it's worth) by not wearing uniform, and don't get the reward of provoking a discipline issue over it.
Anyone remember the boys who were told that they couldn't wear shorts, so they came in in uniform skirts, instead? A nice two fingers to too strict rules, point made, and the staff took it in the spirit of respectful disrespect in which it was intended.
The founder of my alma mater once had a boy come to the school with a record of absconding. At the end of their introductory meeting, he put some money on the mantlepiece, and told the boy, "There is your train fare home. If you decide to run away, you can come and get it".
I should probably note that I did second myself, once. The police picked a friend and I up on the M2, about halfway home, and the headmaster was summoned to collect us; in the spirit of his predecessor (though rather more angry), he offered to drop us back on the motorway to finish our journey.

But 5moreminutes you are experiencing the non-uniform system as one single person and therefore you are in no position to say that it would be fine for everyone else if only they experienced it themselves.

Plenty of people who suffered poverty as a child have said how a non-uniform school was a nightmare for them, and your experience does not outweigh theirs.

How about having a recommended uniform, but making it optional

Now there you really would be at the mercy of your parents, wouldn't you? Way to split your school into factions.

Or to save teacher time having to ask to see the card that is usually issued in these scenarios, which seems far more likely, tbh

Or they could just not mention anything at all and save even more time?

The infringements listed weren't huge. Hair band colours and degrees of shine on patent shoes.
Neither of which would be noticed by anyone unless they were seriously looking for something. I would say that if you aren't worried about the time taken debating if something's black.or very very very dark blue or trying to find fault with what are obviously just new school shoes and then had out lanyards then why are you so worried about the time taken to ask for card?

Or they could just not mention anything at all and save even more time?

You're arguing against the school enforcing their uniform, which will get you nowhere in an argument against lanyards in particular.

Just heard that my daughter's former high school are changing their uniform AGAIN next year. One of the new things will be a black skirt that has a small logo on it. So, instead of being able to buy a bog-standard (cheaper) skirt from Matalan/Tesco/Primark or wherever, parents will have to buy it from the one and only stockist in town. Oh, and you can only buy them in packs of two.

FFS! I'm so glad my kids have left school.

Oh I'm a fan of regulation skirts. We could have any navy skirt at my high school and each year there would be a new skirt that was in fashion. I've seen people in my class who are now in their 40s say on Facebook they could never afford the fashionable skirt and had to have hand me down skirts instead. Dd's regulation plain skirt from the uniform shop costs 13.99, but it would be no problem wearing a hand me down as they last very well so no one would know because they are all the same style.

But little

That's like saying you cab walk into any shop grab a size 10 and have it fit no problem.

One size does not fit all. What happens when you have a tall skinny child where by the time you size down enough for the waist to fit it's too far above the knee?

Or your child is small and the skirts start at an age 10 and she's still in a 7-8.

That's why it's better to be able to have a choice. To find a size and style that fits

No problem. The skirt comes in three different lengths.

Can't be arsed to RTFT but I presume someone has spotted the dreadful wording on the lanyard / pass thingy?

It's not always the length that's the problem though.

There will be kids who need adult sizes or still be in primary school sizes.

Size jumps between two sizes cab also be awkward for instance they grow out of the 9-10 bit 10-11 can be massive. That's where being able to go to a range if shops and try different styles if skirts comes in.

What makes you think the skirts don't cater for adult sizes and primary school sized kids? I take it you aren't bothered about the poor kids unable to keep up with fashion skirts in the example i gave from my own high school then? Anyway good luck for when your own kids start high school. I hope you find the teachers there much more reasonable than you are imagining. They are fine in dc school.

Why regulation skirts at tree times the price of supermarket versions equally as smart In the first place?

I'm pretty sure people cab get a good few fashion clothes for the price of kitting out uniform anyway.

Thirty quid per blazer 14 quid for skirts etc costs me enough with primary and that's being able to use Tescos

They all miraculously become able to cope again in mufti at sixth form, round here. For many local pupils, the uniform is just a weird 11-16 interlude between non-uniform primaries and non-uniform sixth form.

Oh come on noble - children living in poverty where most aren't sadly stand out in uniform too - outgrown or unravelled or faded/ stained / stretched after being washed too often. Shoes are the main tell tale - outgrown, cheap and falling apart, second hand and I'll fitting or just having to say in front of everyone that the reason they aren't wearing regulation shoes is their parents can't or won't pay for them near the end of term. It's easier to hide that where there aren't set items you "have" to have.

Where uniform is logoed and changed second hand isn't even an option for that year, and hard to source the next.

The more anally retentive about uniform and the more disproportionate the punishment for minor breaches of the rules, the more shite the school, IMO.

It's easier to hide that where there aren't set items you "have" to have.

It's easier to hide that you only own a couple of sets of clothes when everyone else is wearing the same clothes every day too.

At a school I worked at many years ago the pupil was given a slip of paper to show it had been flagged up and parents contacted. Most parents are supportive of a uniform then you get the different types:

1. I cannot afford it (but cannot afford to give the child an expensive phone - priorities sort them out.
2. I don't agree with it -
3. I think that 'D needs to be treated as an individual to show her creative side...blah de blah..." guess what the rules apply even you your D
4. Genuinely cannot afford or have so many issues/problems that the child is left to sort things themselves - these are the ones to feel for