To hope schools scrap uniforms

[greengoldfish]

It can’t surely be possible to wash blazers and heavy kilt like skirts on a daily basis.

AIBU to hope this means an end to uniform, or if not, a return to some comfy jogging bottoms, polo shirts and cardis/jumpers?

No uniforms might work in primary, but in high school if your kids don’t wear the right brands they will be mocked mercilessly. Yes it’s wrong but let’s not pretend it doesn’t happen.
Not all older kids are happy with charity shop stuff either.

@Zilla1 uniform does a lot of work in this country. It stops bullying, erases societal imbalances, prepares children for work and now apparently it is also fucking PPE. Magical thinking, indeed.

Of course we won't have to wash the entire uniform every day!

Non-uniform day was my most hated day of the school year (bar sports day). I hated having to decide what to wear and knowing it would be judged. Permanent no uniform would be a nightmare.

In 1992 when I was in year 8 my school only required the blazer to be compulsory for everyone in lower school. Once girls got to upper school (Yr10) they didnt have to wear it. There was a school wide vote and it went in favour of making the blazer compulsory throughout. I loved it, soany useful pockets.

Then I changed to a new school for 6th form which had no uniform and we had regular conversations wishing there was one because it would be so much easier.

@TimeForLunch why not? That's what we're doing now, with fewer people around.

For those with experience of schools without uniform, how is it policed

It didn't need to be really. The rules were few and sensible: shoes could not be slip on / backless , and tops had to have sleeves - they could be short sleeves, but not spaghetti straps, or sleeveless.

For those with experience of schools without uniform, how is it policed?

My son is only in primary, yet on non-uniform day in February there were still children head to toe in very expensive clothing

That's because in a uniformed school non-uniform days are a novelty. When they never wear uniform from nursery onwards clothes are just clothes and people wear normal knockabout practical clothes to their taste. Parents didn't kit their kids out in endless new outfits, they just wore their casual play clothes. There really was no bullying. It was a school that dealt incredibly well with promoting a good ethos amongst kids and staff anyway. South London, mix of scruffy middle class families and very disadvantaged.

Non-uniform day was my most hated day of the school year (bar sports day). I hated having to decide what to wear and knowing it would be judged. Permanent no uniform would be a nightmare

So should children generally wear a uniform throughout all their waking hours? What happens at weekends? What about Uni?

No uniforms might work in primary, but in high school if your kids don’t wear the right brands they will be mocked mercilessly

In my kids' S London schools brands are considered pathetic. They really are not interested. And they don't bully around clothing choices. Maybe because a lot of them came from uniform-free primaries?

Does anyone have a Dd at Camden Girls? Is it an issue there?

So should children generally wear a uniform throughout all their waking hours? What happens at weekends? What about Uni?

I probably would have been happy with a uniform at weekends! I certainly didn't bother changing after school. But only having to think about it 2 days a week definitely easier than 7 for me and for a lot of us in my 6th form

ComeBy there's no point. People in this country worship uniform. I don't get it, but it's true. Apparently children in the UK need 12 years to learn that they must dress appropriately for the workplace, because they are so stupid that it takes this long. If we do not keep children in uniform, they will turn up at work on their first day in a sarong, bikini top and Crocs.

And if we do not have uniform, mayhem will break out in schools. No learning will take place at all. Look at other countries where school age children run riot, setting fire to things and robbing banks on a daily basis.

If we do not have uniforms, children will get lost on school trips, never to be seen again. This happens daily in other countries where there is no school uniform - just look it up.

If we do not have uniform, bullying will increase to the epidemic levels seen in other countries where there is no uniform, and children will spend hours every morning having to decide what to wear that day. In fact, they will all be getting up at 4 am to get dressed in time for school.

I may have exaggerated the above slightly, but these are the arguments I see time and time again.

SimonJT clothing was not policed in my school. Behaviour was.

I agree in a way, a basic cheap uniform for all schools is more than enough. A pack of polo shirts from asda is fine for primary school and parents should have that option for secondary too. The uniform at our local school is almost £600 and that will need replacing whenever they grow so possibly yearly. I think it’s important to have a uniform to set them apart and avoid bullying based on what clothes you can afford, but the expensive uniform needs knocking on the head.

TBH I do think my daughters school do look neater with blazers then they used to with jumpers.
Most jobs i have had. Have had some kind of uniform. And if no uniform then at least some rules. (But the majority have a uniform.)

My kids wear pinafore for daughter, black trousers son. White polo t shirts. Cardigan
Or jumper bought from supermarket. Mind you they are only 8 and 9. Don’t buy blazers.

I have a lot of friends who went to school in the states. They all say that they were bullied about their clothes, all but one would rather have had some form of uniform. Just something like black trousers, polo etc. I am in favour of uniforms but just generic trousers, sweatshirts etc.
I don't know where you all went to school but I have never known a school deal with bullying.

The government guidance is that uniforms do not need to be washed daily as it has no benefit.

Years ago the whole point of uniform was it was cheaper than normal clothes and it identified the school the child came from. Now school uniform is far more expensive than normal clothes £35 for a badged blazer and I’ve never had to spend that much on a winter coat for my kids. Once
The kids take their tie off the school can’t be identified as they all wear white shirt and black trousers.

@myself2020 I'm from a country that doesn't and never has had school uniform and the kids were never bullied.

Also, people who work in offices and call centres etc don't have a dress code in my home country. Turn up in what you like so long as you actually turn up and do your job.

Are many schools insisting on washing every day? Ours isn't.

I’d like to know how they’d prove you hadn’t 😂

Uniforms do not need to be cleaned any more often than usual, nor do they need to be cleaned using methods which are different from normal

So not the clean every day they are currently advising. I was hoping for no blazers and less badged stuff.

I work in the NHS and it's really only ward staff who wear uniforms. The rest of us wear smart casual clothes. There's a policy to define what that is - it's short and clear. Uniforms tend to be worn by retail staff and franchise restaurant staff - I've never worn a uniform in any of my past jobs and I'm old.

Our school hasn't said anything about wearing different uniform each day or not wearing ties, as some schools have.

I'd be happy to see the back of uniform. Other countries seem to manage to educate their children perfectly well without it.

Secondaries should simplify uniform so that having three full changes of uniform costs a parent no more than buying their child three changes of Primark clothes.

Supermarket polo shirt+supermarket sweatshirt+ supermarket trousers/skirt/shorts

I think schools may just be realising how their bright ideas of expensive single supplier uniform is about to bite them in the arse.

Instead of being able to return in smart, cheap and readily available supermarket uniform , they now have to worry about if people can get a fitting appointment and the fact that no one is going to order by a mid july cut off point an expensive and potentially useless uniform.

And no one after months of furlough is gonna have anywhere near enough spare cash to buy a range of sizes pay for delivery and returns for some stupid online company that may not even be able to fulfil the order after they took months off themselves.

Least in regular clothes or supermarket uniform you either have it already or can get it. Buying a hoody in a L and it being a bit big is still an easier issue to deal with than a blazer that's three sizes too large.

The kids are gonna look a right state when they go back all cos schools got snobby about clothes.