Secondary school shoes

[Fedup360]

My son starts secondary school in September and I don’t know what kind of shoes or 0.e trainers to get him? I know it’ll vary from area to area but what kind of shoes will help him blend in? I’m worried about inadvertently getting him bullied by getting him something “not cool” 🫠

What is the school policy?

Boys don’t really care in my experience.

get something that fits the school policy though.

It says leather shoes and suitable lace up trainers

Do they have picture examples? What is and what is not a "suitable lace up trainer" sounds like a minefield.

Mine wears Nike Air Forces, they're expensive but they're the only ones that last the school year!

Usually suitable lace up trainers means no coloured branding or logos. So if they had Air Force for example the Nike ticks etc would need to be all black. In my experience boys aren’t too bothered. A basic pair of black lace up shoes from Tesco or similar sufficed and could be replaced fairly frequently and inexpensively. Depends what they will be doing at break time as well as some of younger ones still play football so something that isn’t going to get too wrecked by that might be good.

Beware the need to buy a pair a term as their feet grow too. A friend was commenting that her daughter had had two pairs of school shoes from Y7 to Y11 recently and so they could be expensive. DS1 has gone from a size 8 to a size 11 in fiver terms since the start of Y7. Ouch!

Kickers - Sports Direct sell them

They all wear Nike Air Force or Nike Court Low here.

I railed at the price but the Air Force have worn better than his Clarke's ever did.

Secondary school teacher here, Nike Air Force are the choice of about 75% of the students.

To add to that, I bought them for my own kids. They are initially an expensive outlay, but comfortable and hard wearing, and don’t leave stupid marks all over the corridors like “proper” school shoes.

Our school shoes could not be trainers. Generally just whatever Clarks fitted in years 7 and 8 and Velcro fastening. After that something slightly more trendy and lace up or slip on probably. Re trainers for PE and football boots. There were no logo restrictions so it was what fitted well and had right kind of studs

Kickers are very popular here.

Nike Air Force, most of the secondary kids round here wear them and they last amazingly. Plus they are full black and polishable leather which usually fits most school uniforms criteria.

Not all schools allow trainers.

Park outside the school at drop off or pick up time for 10 mins and you’ll soon see what shoes they wear.

Bags will probably all be black so get a small discreet coloured ‘zip pull tag’ to add to the zip so a little easier to spot when piled on the floor in the playground. Google zip pull tag to see what I mean.

Nike air force in our school but other schools don’t allow

My sons were not allowed trainers so wore dr marten style clarks shoes. Same shoes (getting bigger) all the way from year 7 to 11.

Our school allows Nike fortunately

Check school policy. AF1s and Kickers would not be allowed at the DC’s high school, or any local schools.

Our uniform policy had pictures. Locally some schools around here allow trainers and some don’t. Ours doesn’t, but the pictures in the guide have been helpful.

Yup. If not more than 75%! X

Aside, but weirdly my son's school which allows AF1's won't allow DM's because of the yellow stitching...

Riddle me that!

In this mismash of MN answers the uniform policy is definitely your friend OP!