Single supplier/ expensive trousers and skirts AIBU

[Miloarmadillo2]

DS due to start Y7 in September at local academy state secondary. They've just moved academy trust and are reviewing the uniform. The proposed trousers are identical to the grey school trousers sold in every supermarket in the land, but now have the school badge embroidered on a pocket and are £20. This is in addition to the badged blazer, jumper, tie, sports kit etc. Is this normal? What possible difference can it make which pair of grey trousers everyone wears? I have filled in their consultation saying it's ridiculous, hope other parents feel the same way!

It's because some kids and parents take the possibility and send their child in jeggings/skin tight trousers/boys in baggy low arse crack showing ones.

Schools eventually get fed up dealing with arguing with parents so put in regulation skirts and trousers.

YANBU. It's a pain in the arse. And costs loads. Shame schools have to impose it but such is the world these days.

Piss.

Not possibility. Sheesh, my autocorrect doesn't even let me half swear.

It's annoying isn't it.

My DC's secondary has this too, only logo trousers to be worn, £19 per pair.

Patents did complain at the beginning, but it didn't make a difference. They was about four years ago now.

Now I just stuck it up. Two pairs of trousers and two pairs of shorts per child. Generally lasts the year until they grow out of it.

I'm pissed off about it - this is our third choice school, it will cost us £700 a year in bus fares to get him there, trundling straight past our local walking-distance school he didn't get in to, and the uniform is already expensive without additional branded items.

Everhthing MissMarplesKnitting says.

Is it a pain in the arse? Yes.
Does it matter exactly what type of grey trousers are? No.

Do schools have to go down that route because some parents decide they are incapable of following a simple school uniform from the high street? Yes.

Some people are incapable of following simple rules because they don't like them. Schools have to respond to that culture.

They may wish to respond to that culture, but they have to respect the government guidelines against having single supplier uniforms.

Unfortunately there is no penalty attached to that for non-compliance. But it is still bad practice, and should be challenged.

CAB used to have a campaign about reducing/removing the hidden costs to education - especially ones such as these which shouldn't exist in the first place - but I don't know if it is still going.

I'd support the school. The evidence shows that schools with strict uniform policies have better outcomes. It's not just about getting money out of parents- it's about discipline and uniformity. IMO every school should have a clear and consistent uniform policy- right down to trousers, socks, coats and bags, which should all be compulsory logoed items.

Well our school is very strict with uniform but still manages to specify generic black trousers (no jeans, no joggers, no skintight), black blazers and white shirts. The only logoed items are the blazer and the school jumper and you can by the badge to sew on yourself if you don't want to use their supplier.

So no, YANBU. Uniform should be affordable for all, not a way of putting poorer families off from applying.

Oh and you can be strict about uniform by policing it. It doesn't have to be expensive. Of course parents complain about that too but it's easier to defend if the uniform is cheap and easily available in the first place.

Do schools have to go down that route because some parents decide they are incapable of following a simple school uniform from the high street? Yes

Not sure I buy this line. They still have to police the uniform rules and expensive trousers doesn’t force the really stubborn offenders.

I'd support the school. The evidence shows that schools with strict uniform policies have better outcomes

Really?

Believeitornot
True but it removes the endless meetings with parents trying to argue that a pair of skinny fashion trousers aren't skinny fashion trousers. (Usually it becomes bingo, a bit like on here. It starts with 'but they aren't fashion trousers', then they aren't skinny, then but trousers don't affect their brain and then some sort of ridiculous claims of body shaming. The reality is parent chooses not to be the sensible adult in this situation).

I don't like single supplier, but I see why some schools go down that route.

Life would be so much easier if people saw a rule like 'plain black straight leg trousers/no fashion or skinny trousers' and simply bought their child a pair within the rule.

There’s often an industry around private schools of tailors (mostly Indo-Pakistani) who will ‘forge’ uniforms. If you live near one take an old pair of school trousers, the new one, and they might be able to transfer the badge across for.

DD goes to a grammar where the boys can wear plain black trousers, but the girls skirts are single supplier, £24 each and the trousers similar
She chose to wear trousers, so I just got 2 for £10 from Sainsbury's as she is growing so quickly. No-one has said a peep to her. It's rather unfair that the boys can buy from anywhere, but girls

Oops.
Girls uniform must be from supplier only.

Maybe I should be grateful they are not asking for badges on socks then! ( apart from the sport socks)

Thanks meditrina I will have a look for CAB advice. It's worth complaining whilst they are 'consulting' but it reads very much like a done deal.

The current logo items add up to £140 (blazer, jumper, tie, multiple compulsory items of sports kit) and then 2 pairs of logo trousers is another £40. Will also need unspecified white shirts, socks, shoes, trainers and football/rugby boots - it's easily £250. The CAB says (from 4 yrs ago) that a quarter of parents were spending over £100.

It's a ridiculous cost.
Part of it will be because there's not the same mass production. Part is companies raking it in because parents have no choice (and no company in that line will tender much lower than competitors because they all havr an interest in keeping single supplu rates high).

Our local academy has logo embroidered single supplier skirts for the girls... boys can wear any black trousers. That one pisses me off because it's controlling what girls wear more in terms of "enforcing modesty" (the rationale for the skirt restrictions are to control skirt length - doesn't work cos the kids just hang onto their year 7 one as long as they possibly can till it's microscopic anyway) and costing parents of one sex child more than the others.

I'd support the school. The evidence shows that schools with strict uniform policies have better outcomes.

This is correlation not causation, obviously.

It is a bit like saying children with a larger shoe size better than those with smaller shoes, which is also true.

I would like to see the data corrected for wealth. I suspect all this study is doing is

I hate all this uniform crap. It is essentially putting education back to pre WW2 standards where a child from a 'poor' background wins a scholarship to a Secondary School but can't attend because their parents can't afford the uniform. I have been looking at local secondary schools for my child and there are some I am pretty much crossing off the list because of the over the top /everything with logo uniforms because I am worrying about both the cost and the fact my daughter has sensory problems around some clothes. This shouldn't be the case. It's wrong. So wrong. Absolutely ridiculous the whole bloody uniform obsession.

Just encountering this now for myself, 25 years after I left secondary as DD gets her "welcome pack" for her new school. Top buttons must be done up, jumpers not allowed without a blazer on top, blazers need permission to be removed, single supplier skirt, single supplier PE kit, from a shop in a different town to the main uniform supplier.. my mind is blown.

Although not as much as when I read about the sixth form policy, which is apparently quite common. Smart formal wear and suits only. Like, what? I'm a professional, I'm probably the smartest dressed on my team (smart casual) and I'd not be able to study a day at any local sixth form it seems. Rules like "the compulsory jacket must be from the same bolt of cloth as the trousers" - the heck?

The joy of sixth form was ditching the uniform to wear something comfortable!

I don't disagree with uniforms necessarily, but I do worry about how strict they've become. DD has ASD, and her personal care is not at the same level of her peers although it's not horrific or anything. She is also very very much a stickler for rules and being "good", and this is going to cause her so much anxiety. Whether she ends up obsessing over whether she has it right to avoid being disciplined which would destroy her confidence, or being disciplined because she couldn't find her school socks, it just seems so.. not conducive to learning.