School Uniform

[ScarletWitchM]

AIBU to say that if schools insist on kids wearing blazers/ PE kit etc all with their logo that they should subsidise the cost - or just have one item - like the blazer that is logo and the rest can be plain?

just cost me £400 on uniform as DS has had a growth spurt (fml) and next year they change all the colours for the upper school so will have to buy all again 🤦‍♀️

all from only one (terrible) schoolwear shop

With all the additional costs we are experiencing schools should really review their policies

DS's school is generic uniform. Only the tie is special to the school which is fair enough. The school know they have a very mixed catchment and many can't afford the premium.

Funnily the kids look smarter than the ones from the prescriptive schools because they can buy brands that fit them neatly. The extra bonus is that it's been more affordable to buy dyspraxic DS extra uniform so he's not having to constantly wear the previous few days' sponged down dinner on his blazer.

The local school is on yet another academy trust new uniform in the hope of raising standards. I doubt that it will work miracles yet again.

I have taught in a non-uniform school and loved it. You could wear comfortable clothes for the weather and I lost not one second of teaching time quibbling clothing. I'm not against uniform but it needs to be comfortable, practical and affordable. It's often elitist and ableist though.

Schools get paid by the school uniforme provider for each item you buy. It’s such a scam and the headteachers collude because they need the money.

I have zero respect for headteachers that require a logo on uniform, or a specific provider. Zero.

I didn’t know that! And will now ask the governors what they do with that money - what a rip off for the parents/carers though

I’m in one of the most deprived boroughs for child poverty in the country and the cost of £40 for a blazer and £30 per jumper it’s putting many families in a difficult position

I don't understand the need for blazers at all. Jumper would be sufficient. Even skirt/trousers style are designated & need to come from school uniform supplier.
Annoying.....

I don’t mind a uniform as such but the need for a logo’d one from one supplier (in our case, located veeery far from the school) and the branded PE kit, blazer etc escapes me. My lowlight is the need for two jumpers - a branded green one for every day, and a plain green one for PE. Dear lord why?

Agreed…. And my DS is some sort of giant aged 13 so almost in mens trousers- which uniform shop don’t cater for 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♀️😖😖

I don't know if this would work but get to know some of the parents from the older years. For the last two years some parents at my ds school have formed a group so uniforms get passed on at the end of year. Those kids who are leaving have no use for theirs now so bags of uniform get passed around. Everyone takes what they need and replace with the bits their boys have grown out of.
Saved me and many others a fortune these last two years

My ds has a really awkward uniform. The only piece that isn't logoed is the shirt which is light blue BUT has to have a white colour. So impossible to buy from a supermarket. The only uniform provider is in Birmingham and we are in Bolton so the school hold a pop up uniform shop once a year.

Good idea! Unfortunately as DS in secondary and both DH and I work FT we are rarely at school to see any other parents… and DS friends are all same size or smaller than him! So I’ve passed on his old blazer & jumpers!

Bonkers?!!! I was queuing up (over an hour) at the one uniform shop and the family behind had had to travel across London as this was their only option

I find it ridiculous, DS has just started secondary and everything has to be purchased from the school shop, luckily as a boy he can wear a plain white shirt but the girls have to wear specific blouses which is terrible.

Plus the PE kit all has to be from the school shop, not just shorts and top, but socks (£10) as well as a rugby top and shorts. To be fair the PE kit looks really nice (much smarter than their uniform I think!) but no one gets to see it except the people in school.

Until people really start getting angry about this, nothing will change. I would like to see some real teeth in the law: if uniform isn't available from high street retailers with logos supplied at cost, OFSTED should put the school straight into special measures. That would focus a few minds.

You know what I think you are right…. I think we need a revolution!

I think their should be some obligation that the uniform can be bought directly from the school without delivery costs (or driving for 40 minutes to a completely different town in the next County, which is what I had to do.).

I thought DDs uniform was a bargain compared to what my parents had to pay out though... despite the skirts being more expensive than the blazer! Blazers £25, Skirts £27, PE tshirt £8, skort, £9, socks £4, warm top £15. Tie £5. Then plain white blouses, shoes and trainers. But its still expensive if you don't have £100 or so spare.

Plain skirts/trousers, shirts/polos and jumpers n a school colour should be plenty really. Then a generic sort of PE kit with schools providing team kit for teams.

Dc1 is starting high school this year and we've got the majority of his uniform free because they did 2 pre-loved uniform giveaways, which included some brand new items donated by Next. I think all schools should do that.

With the COL crisis I can see schools will need larger isolation rooms to cope with the number of transgressions or to rethink their policies.

My DC went to independent school, the boys uniform apart from house tie, pe t shirt with a colour stripe also denoting house and a school badge to sew on to the blazer was all able to be bought on the High St. DD had more specialist uniform but the second hand shop was well stocked. I bought very little new.
My friends DC went to state schools, the uniform for them was 3 times the cost of mine.

My DS's school just had a parent survey about uniform so n response to the feedback all coloured hair and styles will allowed, there will be 3 different lengths for the tartan skirt as most girls turn it up. Children are still not allowed to wear laddered tights but they can now wear leggings! They can wear long sleeve tops under the logoed school tops. It is funny to suggest they are going to be slack as they are concerned about mental health but then everything has a logo on it. So pe kit leggings even . My youngest's skirt for year 7 cost £60 in the end as I had to pay for it to be altered and shortened as I asked about the 3 new lengths and the school shop said they'd not heard anything about it!!

Sorry shouldn't have said girls then as a couple of boys do wear thee skirt in my son's year, year 11.

Blazer, skirt, jumper, tie, pe shorts, pe top, pe jumper - all badged/ school design. Oh and choose gcse PE and there is a different pe top and jumper.

All for a state comprehensive. It's a scandal.

as i always say on these threads: the British obsession with school uniforms, especially where they insist on something you can only get from a shop that is open for 30 minutes every other full moon, is batshit. Completely and utterly batshit

I like uniforms because I grew up poor and mainly wore my brothers hand me downs- I would have been absolutely annihilated if we had to wear our own clothes! Uniform was cheap then though and quite hardy. I think if emblems are required on blazers then they should either be very affordable or the logo should be given as a badge to sew on for free.

This sounds like the school are actually listening to what people want and not stuck in some Victorian time warp! As I said before my DD had pink hair from Y9 which had no impact on her education and now she’s at uni where they don’t give a toss what people wear or look like!
I actually don’t mind them having some sort of ‘uniform’ it’s just the stupid logo on everything and the monopoly the uniform shops seem to have (including no competition on pricing) which is most annoying

I am a teacher. I think uniform should be a plain polo and sweatshirt with jeans. Footwear should be whatever is flat and comfy. End of. It really is ridiculous to be wasting all this money and effort on what kids wear. I used to support uniform but many families cannot afford the increasingly expensive demands to kit out their kids every Sept.

Logos should be dropped.