To refuse to rebuy five years of primary school uniform

[Schooluniform2018]

Our small primary school has always had a uniform. I have had one child pass through the school into high school and therefore have enough shirts, pinafores and logo cardigans to pass down to my youngest two. Currently in years 1 and 3.

Deputy head was recently promoted to head and promised 6 months ago that the uniform was staying the same with a logo change in the cardigans.

Today they have decided that the colour of the uniform has to change. (Not sure if pinafore/trouser colour is changing yet)

So could we buy new pe kits, jumpers/cardigans and maybe pinafores/trousers !

So I have five years of uniform...enough for my youngest two to wear all their school life, in good condition and they want me to spend a lot of money which I simply do not have to replace the uniform.

Oh and they didn't bother to ask parents opinion, just presented it as a done deal.

AIBU to tell the school that my kids will be still wearing their old uniform colours until they graduate to high school in five years time, as I don't have the money to rebuy new stuff :(

I heard that uniform is optional at primary school, so hoping that will work in my favour.

I am so upset. It is a good school with no reason to change the existing nice uniform, the new one is made by the same uniform shop in the same materials just different colour and logo.

Still less favourable if the girls can't choose black trousers...

Unfortunately my oldest girl is tiny and will need an age appropriate uniform. My littlest girl is very big for her age and is on a size ahead of her age. So I can't get two years out of the oldest girls clothes as it needs to be handed down.

"Still less favourable if the girls can't choose black trousers"
I assume they can. But my girls like skirts and pinafores and I don't like the look and price of the school one...I want the option to buy a supermarket one in black (and then throw away all the ones I have in grey ;( )

I’m sure you could manage with a slightly larger uniform for them to start off and cope with it being a bit too small to finish. If money is tight you would just have to. Like the rest of us. No need to make it more expensive than it has to be.

Did your eldest daughter have a new uniform every year?

How are your kids uniforms able t be used for two more children? Very little of my children's uniform after a full year (sometimes two) use I would want to to use on another child.

Sorry but uniforms change and you have to suck it up. Maybe sell your other uniforms to help fund the cost? But to be fair supermarket uniforms are so cheap there isn't an excuse not to buy new.

I am amazed that the school uniform you have is going to withstand being passed down twice without being stained, frayed or having holes in it!

If you need the new uniform from September 2019, then your youngest will be in year 3 and 5.

Buy older girl uniform to fit two years. Buy younger girl uniform to fit two years. If they are the same size then buy younger girl uniform again in year 5. So two sets of uniform in 2019, one two years later.

Alternatively if older is one size ahead, then younger can have hand-me-downs in year 5, but will likely need a bigger size in year 6. So two sets of uniform in 2019, one three years later.

It should only be £200 in 2019, then £100 two or three years later.

Still £300 you shouldn't have to spend (and I would still fight it) but not as much as you calculated.

I would prefer the rollout to reception only but my backup would be supermarket priced option. Sigh. My third option is the other school. Then I could get supermarket uniform for sure.

Of course you don’t have to buy each child new uniform every year!! What a waste!! At my sons prep school the pre worn uniform stall at the school fair was one of the busiest!! Nobody would be bullied, nobody could tell or would even care!! But you keep filling landfill with perfectly good clothes!!

The school is changing uniform. That means you have to buy the new uniform. There is no story here.

My lad gets the boy options that aren't handed down.

It is the brand new been on one girl, uniform I wanted to hand down.

Seriously? I'm skint and even I manage to get a new uniform at least once a year for both my kids.

Asda, Tesco, Morrisons - they all sell cheap uniform. I fail to believe you literally can't afford to buy uniform but CAN afford to send them in their own clothes. You don't need to get the logo stuff, just get a basic cardigan etc.

Contact the Education Department. They can give you a Grant or vouchers for Uniform if you can't afford it

I do think passing down shirts & Polo shirts is a bit grim though.....

OP - that is all outrageous. Virtually everything they are proposing contradicts guidance from the DfE (which I linked to on page 1). The bags thing for eg. Gang up with other parents. Insist on low cost alternatives and staggering in changes over a number of years

At our school I thought I was alone in objecting but once I spoke to other parents 75 families co-signed a letter of objection to the branded kit and the school backtracked.

You won't be other only family who can't afford this unneccesary expense. I had 3 separate parents confide in me that they had taken/would have to take payday loans to cover the costs, I was horrified.

If as a pp suggests the change of uniform generates income for the school through a deal with a shop this is specified as not allowed and the governors could get hauled over the coals.

How on earth is passing down perfectly clean & serviceable polo shirts grim? That really is a seriously entitled attitude. If you take care of stuff it's fine - possibly not all of it, but most of it.