School punishing/excluding children for not wearing 'logo' school jumper, what is the law?

[littleducks]

State primary. School uniform jumper (no cardigan/fleece option) is sold from school office at £7.50

Yesaterday was school photo day. Children in the 'wrong' jumper (plain colour no logo) or who had taken off their jumper due to the heat and were wearing correct colour gingham dress/shirt were made to wear another childs jumper.

As in child A didnt feel hot and was wearing jumper was told to take it off for child B in dress to wear then child C who wore plain jumper had to take off plain jhumper, put on child A's.

Cue whispering in the playground at lunch about parents buying wrong clothes/not being able to afford right stuff.

I thought that uniform for primary wasnt 'compulsary' or allowed to be sold from just one supplier?

It's not quite right to say that uniform at primary school isn't compulsory. The school doesn't have to have a uniform but, if it does, it can make wearing uniform part of the home-school agreement. If wearing uniform is a "condition of attendance" then the school could (if it chose) refuse to allow a child into school in the incorrect uniform. It would be recorded as an unauthorised absence.

Anyway, none of this is relevant to the situation being discussed here, where nobody has been punished or excluded. I agree that it's odd to have one general rule for uniform and one for uniform in school photos, although (come to think of it) in all my child's school photos taken in summer nobody is wearing a jumper. Maybe this is a little quirk of school photographers?

Anne, yes, uniform obsession is mildly nuts

I see no reason why schools can't just sell the logo badge to sew on the cheap stuff from Tesco. That would make things more affordable I'm sure.

Annelonditton - I agree with you and I'm a teacher! And I'm sorry if it makes me a snob but I hate to see my kids school photos ruined for posterity by random jumpers, t-shirts and what ever else the nonconformist parents see fit to dress their children in! If I went to teach in hot pants and a crop top there would soon be an uproar. What's wrong with standards in dress code? If you expect your teachers to dress appropriately then why not the children? One child came to school in a spiderman suit as the parent said he wouldn't wear his uniform! Do we let him off and expect the rest of the class to be in various fancy dress the next day or do we make a stand? Yes this is an extreme but these things can creep in unless the school is seen to be firm.

Ps. Why not cut the badges off the old/outgrown uniform and then sew it onto supermarket uniform if you want?

Tinytalker, when I look at my kids and see random jumpers and T-shirts, I see without exception a child from a disadvantaged family where either money, or adult input, is scarce to nonexistant. In most cases I am so glad to see them safe at school each morning, some of them even washed and fed, that they could wear neon pink hotpants if they choose.

It's different for me. I am paid a salary, everyone has the right to expect that I should spend some of it on appropriate work clothes.

kids talking about other kids because they had the wrong jumper on, sounds just like the 80's and iam glad to see that school uniform is still doing its part to promote bullying.

At my DC's school, when the photographer comes a photo is taken in correct uniform (either borrowed or childs own) for the front cover of their end of year report. This is not the photo that the parents buy, just an extra one. Can't see the problem myself.

We live in a so called 'posh, middle class area' where the majority of families at my ds's school have plenty of money etc. There are however a number of less advantaged families who have children at the school, mine included. Some have been moved into local housing by the council or housing associations, but they are no better off financially and still struggle to make ends meet, my own situation is more complicated and although we live in a good area, we also struggle financially.

School jumpers and cardigans with logos on are compulsory (it is in our home-school agreement) only supplied by the school office and are £12 per jumper. I cannot afford to replace a jumper every time one of them marks theirs with whiteboard pen (which is regular occurrence).

I used to keep a spare one for each of them just for school trips and photographs, but I can no longer afford to have a jumper each sitting in the wardrobe, only getting worn three times in a year before its outgrown.

My children are always correctly kitted out for school, quite apart from anything else, I was bullied myself at school for not having the same uniform as everyone else and never want my own children to go through that, but far from looking smart, particularly by this time of year, their jumpers are worn, washed out and I suppose pretty scruffy (by my standards anyway). I simply can't afford to replace them, when they will most likely be outgrown before September. Not to mention that come September, all the other children have nice bright new uniforms to wear and not having the same would mark my boys out as difference or 'less than' in an instant.

Now apparently I have to worry that some teachers and parents will consider my children potential trouble makers just because we don't have the money to keep them in brand spanking new unforms for the whole of the school year. Nice.

I also think its awful that anyone thinks a school photo is ruined because the child isn't wearing a jumper with the school logo on. Surely the point of the photo is a memento of the school year for the child and a memory of their child at that age for the parents - absolutely nothing to do with representing the school. My children's jumpers may be a little worn, but they still look lovely in their photographs and I am proud of them whatever they wear.

To be honest, if the school did something about the daft photographer that insists on taking pictures of the children in silly poses, and over contrived positions, their school photos would be vastly improved regardless of what they are wearing.

Our PTA has a large supply of uniform that is in very good condition including logo jumpers & cardigans, trousers, ties, summer dresses, skirts, plimsoles, PE kit and even book bags and sun hats with the school logo. These are on offer to all parents for between 50p-£4 and if a parent were to come to us in need they could have the lot for free. Maybe your schools should think of offering a similar service. At our school there is no need for anyone to feel they can't have the school uniform.

exactly - this is the whole problem with logoed clothes.
the schools just don't realise that not everyone can afford to replace them.
especially when you can get plain ones for less than a fiver from Asda.

It sounds as though it was really just to do with the photo, more than the school, and this chimes with my experience.

Over the last few years, dd2's class photos have got more and more 'symmetrical' - even to the extent of mirroring the kids who still have the sweatshirts in the slightly darker shade of blue which has been gradualy superseded by a paler one by the manufacturers! Hair clips, white shirts, dresses with white collars/dresses with blue collars - from dd's account, it takes ages to get them all symmetrical, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if they swapped sweaters around to achieve this.

By contrast, when dd1 was at primary it was only in year 4 that the head pushed for uniform (or at least school colours) to be worn by all - until then it was about half and half, and I used to let dd have 'dress down Fridays' as did quite a lot of parents, though I would always have sent her in uniform for photos.

Her photos from years 4, 5, and 6 have a gradually dwindling number of children in bright green/orange t-shirts, which frankly do make it look a bit messy. It was always the gnat's-kneecap-away-from-sending-to-Steiner, don't-believe-in-homework-byt-my-child-reads-Hawkins-for-fun, plenty-of-time-for-rules-when-you're-an-adult ones who continued to send their children in tie-tye and orange, as well.

We had a school uniform when I was at primary, but looking at the old school photos you'd almost not be able to tell! It was quite a mixed school socially from wealthy professional families to those from pretty disadvantaged homes, and the comment made earlier about children in the wrong uniform being trouble-makers really struck a cord with me and not a good one. I remember that those children whose dress little resembled the uniform were more likely the trouble-makers, but they were also clearly from poor homes where people were struggling to get children both dressed and fed. But these children were part of our school community and valued and no fuss was ever made about the uniform issue - looking back on our school photos you can see the crazy mishmash of clothes but above all our happiness that we were all included the same. It makes me sad to think that school uniform that should be the great leveller is used to exclude those that are already excluded.

Our primary school kids all wear the jumpers with the school logo. You don't have to have the poloshirt logo tops.

It's not 'legal' it is very much encouraged.

There are several book and bun sales every school year and they also sell decent 2nd hand logo clothes for 50p - £1.00 an item. The school office always seems to be able to get it's hands on uniform for families who struggle financially. But you tend to find the mums passing uniforms onto other mums in the playground for free.

At DS and DD's school there are logo sweatshirts and cardigans. Boys generally nearly all have the logo sweatshirts and girls generally have generic cardigans

DS only wears the logo ones because they have a second hand clothing stall at the school fairs. I probably do not appear to be someone with money problems but I am.

I also hate the idea of someone who is helping in a class scrutinising the children's uniform and deciding that they fit her criteria of "something wrong" with their uniform and that they are the known troublemakers. When I help at school I don't tend to look at uniforms tbh.

You took the words out of my mouth, cornsilks! busy body who sounds a bit mean TBH. Glad alditton doesn't 'change books' at my kids' school, God forbid a sock might have fallen down...wealthy area as well, tut tut me..

When I look at my old school photos (primary no uniform, secondary uniform) I most certainly don't notice what people are wearing. I notice the faces, and the memories they evoke.

When I look at my dds' school photos (nursery/primary, uniform at primary) I see the faces, the children I know, and how my girls are growing.

I am, tbh, by the focus on perfect uniform for photos.

dd has her school photo today - she is wearing a white t-shirt (has genuine button phobia and can't wear polo shirts) and grey school trousers, but asked for red elastics for her pigtails specially. I thought of this thread and felt grateful that her school, whilst maintaining a basic level of uniform/school colours, is more about kids than clothes.

I reckon at ours it's some megalomaniacal photographer with a craving for utter symmetry in all things - because at no other time is anything like this really commented on. My dd has only ever worn navy jumpers from normal shops, except this year she wanted a stupid old logo one from stupid old Rawcliffes....

That makes sense - my mother is an artist (and slightly OCD ) and claims she needs things to look right/artistic. I do have theories, but....!