To think that this teacher should not have told-off a pupil on the bus

[Bookaboo]

Couple of hours after the end of school, a few kids on the bus and a guy who happens to be a teacher at their school.
The teacher stopped one lad , who was probably only in year 7, and started grilling him about why he had no tie on. Told him to see him at break tomorrow for detention, but the kid was on his way home & was doing no harm.
I felt really sorry for the kid & felt like the teacher was just being an asshole.
If that was my son in a few years I wouldn't want him to be treated like that. I know that schools have an image to uphold etc.. but jut couldn't help thinking that stuff like this makes kids feel miserable about going to school.

We could wear any navy skirt and jumper/cardigan at my gramnar in the 80s but i think there was a down side to that, at my school anyway. Each year there would be a new trendy skirt. I was fortunate that i was allowed to buy this, but people who could never afford the trendy skirt have said as adults that they hated never being able to be fashionable and having to wear hand me downs. In dd's school where there is an inexpensive, regulation, plain navy skirt, hand me downs wouldn't be a problem, as they last well.

When I say 'allowed', that's not strictly true. The school had a very long and detailed uniform list. It even specified the colour and fabric of our PE knickers.

We were meant to wear A-line knee-length skirts in charcoal grey gabardine and either a V neck long sleeved jumper or cardigan in the same colour from the two official school outfitters.

In practice we learned that any shade of grey or style would do - within reason. There was a fashion then for pencil skirts, so most girls wore skirts with side, front or back slits or kick pleats. So long as the slit didn't go up to your crotch, teachers would ignore it. I imagine I gave them a good laugh the day I turned up in a skirt that I'd taken in so dramatically I waddled like a penguin.

A skirt from Etam or a jumper from M&S - there was a craze for M&S grey V-necks in my school - were cheaper than items from the official shops. Interestingly, it was the divide between the official outfitters that created the money/class tensions.

Both were expensive, but one more than the other. The tell tale was the blouse, which we all had to wear without question. The posher shop used better buttons - they were like little round pills. The other shop used cheaper flat ones. Their shade of pink candy stripe was harsher than the posh ones. Even though the cheaper outfitters was on my doorstep we'd go on an hour's bus ride to the other one because my mum thought it was better and I wanted to fit in.

No particular reason for my ramble down memory lane, except to say that teenagers can easily work out what's desirable from what's not and that I think I was very lucky to mostly have teachers with a sense that letting teenagers rebel in small ways is better than constantly wasting time on petty infringements of the rules.

We had a rule at school where you had to wear the correct uniform outside of school - ie on the way to and from. Girls weren't allowed to leave without their jumpers on, and boys had to have their ties and blazers on, even on the hottest days.

I remember leaving school once, late, because I'd had hockey practice. I was sweating and so I didn't bother with my jumper, just shoved it in my bag. A -uniform nazi- teacher spotted me (why she was watching the back gates an hour after school had finished, I have no idea), and told me to put it on. I did. I left the school grounds, went round the corner and took it off again. She followed me, told me to put it back on again. And then she proceeded to follow me all the way to the bus stop and waited until I was on the bus to ensure I kept it on. Bizarre. Without my jumper, I was just in a white shirt and black skirt - no one would have known what school I went to!

Epic strike through fail.

It's all right Jay I wouldn't have noticed the strike-through fail unless you'd mentioned it.

We had a blazer. I used to wear it to school on days when a coat would be too hot and a jumper or blouse would be too cold - you know like how adults decide how to dress themselves? That's to answer all those people on this thread fretting about how children will ever be fit for the world of work without rules.

I mentioned that it was a grammar school not as a stealth boast, but to point out that I went to a school that was well-regarded and highly sought-after and yet somehow they managed to turn out well-qualified model citizens without wasting their time with trivia. Perhaps that was the secret.

Parents don't get to choose the bits of school policy they agree with and allow their kids to ignore the rest.
This school appears to have a policy on uniform outside school and school hours. The teacher was enforcing it.
If one of my DC came home and complained about getting a detention for not wearing their uniform properly on the bus, I'd tell they knew the school rules what would happen if they ignored the rules. Simples.

Not really simples, Balloon. If you are happy for the school to boss your children around outside of school hours, when they have no legal right to do so, then I guess that's your business.
Personally, I will object to anything I consider to be unfair or that infringes on my rules for my children. Schools are not always right, their rules are not always fair and reasonable and as a parent it is your job to challenge those rules which are not.

That’s ridiculous Balloons. Where would you draw the line? It’s not unheard of for schools to occasionally make rules which make no sense and quite frankly are unenforceable. The teacher just so happened to be in the right place at the right time but how many other students were there walking around in public with no tie or what ever? Probably quite a lot (and I doubt most people going about their business didn’t even notice nor would they give a shit). Schools simply cannot control a child’s every move outside of school hours and it’s a waste of resources for them to even try.

Schools’ policies tend to also include behaviour going to or from school in uniform. Meaning they can take action on behaviour which is not good. They do have a legal right to do this.

This doesn’t mean that they can or should police every child all the time. But they can challenge those who they see not following the rules, yes.

Balloon, parents certainly do get to pick and choose whether to comply with those bits of school policy that seek to dictate what pupils do when they aren't in school.

I approach the DC's school rules with the assumption that they have been put in place for a reason, even if that reason is not immediately apparent to me. I also assume that teachers are decent human beings doing a difficult job, not nutters who are out to get power kicks from being mean to the children in their care.
I do not believe that a teacher's authority stops the second the school bell rings or the kids are two feet off the premises.
But maybe I am just old fashioned!

Balloon, it's a bit too trusting to just assume the school know what they are doing and that they have good reasons for all the things they say and do.
There are a couple of threads in active at the moment where the schools have made very dodgy decisions, which parents have had to challenge in order to get fair outcomes for their children.
I've heard from my own dc of inappropriate comments made by a male teacher to a female pupil (of a sexual nature). As a parent you have to question and be aware of what is happening at school and challenge where you think it is right to do so. I honestly think that most teachers are decent people with the best interests of their students in mind, but you do get the odd dodgy one.

I would certainly hope that school rules have some sort of reasoning behind them, it would be quite alarming if that were not the case. That doesn't however mean that it must be a good reason. Far too many schools put in place draconian uniform rules not because they seriously believe it does any good but because they think they will impress good conformist middle class parents and the likes of the Daily Mail: it's the children of such parents they want to attract because they think they will be nice and easy to teach, and more likely to push the school up the league tables which in turn reflects well on the head and governors. The trouble is that there's plenty of research that shows that it's a myth that there is any correlation between strict uniform rules and good academic results.

That’s not the reason for uniform rules.

It’s to raise standards. Kids behave better in uniform and better behaviour leads to better results.

There is no robust evidence that there is a correlation between uniform and results:

www.theguardian.com/education/2011/jan/18/school-uniform-results

evidenceforlearning.org.au/toolkit/school-uniform/

That’s not the reason for uniform rules.

It’s to raise standards. Kids behave better in uniform and better behaviour leads to better results.

Goodness, how do the rest of Europe and most of America manage with their low standards

When I taught in europe there were no uniforms and behaviour was great. Students had a dress code.

I will still enforce my school's uniform. It is neither here nor there my feelings about uniform. I can't abide people deciding some rules apply to them and their children but others don't.

I've had a massive uniform issue last week. The cause was less reminding a child to follow uniform and more the fact their mother keeps sending them in saying 'tell your teachers thay I say how you look has nothing to do with your uniform and if they try to give you a detention then you tell them that you don't have to'

Most uniform issues are kids being kids ans a gentle reminder.

Most big issues with uniforms are caused by parents and children with massive attitude problems. The sad fact is that it wouldn't matter if you had no uniform and a dress code instead, people like that just find new rules that their offspring are too special to follow.

British state education is blighted by political and ideological fads. One of the ones we are currently passing through is the myth that uniform transforms a poor achieving school into a good one. Another one is clamping down on absences.

Those things have to be dealt with on a case-by-case nature. However, they are very popular with careerists in national and local politics and also those in the teaching profession.

They are are also popular among some parents who, despite little evidence, resent what they see as dissent by other parents as well as people who don't have children or teenagers but think we're all going to hell in a handcart anyway.