I never used to really like my uniform until I went to college and have non uniform... now I miss it so bad!! I miss getting up every morning and not having to choose what I wear and I miss having LOADS of pockets in my blazer to keep things in. I also think it’s a good idea so people dont get bullied for not having lots of designer brands to wear and it keeps everyone the same

(edited 5 years ago)

Reply 48

Claire461

Original post by Rainfall

thats strange. maybe he had a traumatic experience

Yeh, he did. When the school changed from wearing a shirt and tie to a polo shirt. Very traumatic.

Reply 49

Chris522

Original post by lol0902

I never used to really like my uniform until I went to college and have non uniform... now I miss it so bad!! I miss getting up every morning and not having to choose what I wear and having LOADS of pockets to keep things in. I also think it’s a good idea so people dont get bullied for not having too designer brands to wear and it keeps everyone the same

Okay but do u think it should be blazer and school tie or just a school polo shirt

Reply 50

cf_99

Original post by cf_99

A big fat hate for me.

I just never saw the point. Even after looking at debate forums here, I still don't see the point. Many of the pro-uniform arguements are, in my view, baseless and uninformed. I'll only list a couple now, to stop it from getting too boring.

They look smart: NO THEY F**CKING DON'T! Sorry to be rude here, but seriously? The Girls' uniforms are some of the ugliest clothes I've ever seen! Everything from the vomit-inducing colour schemes, the long skirts and those deck shoes with high white socks; it's not only incredibly outdated, but it's also ugly on so many levels. The boys' uniform is better in that it better resembles clothing actually worn in the real world (only 100 as opposed to 200 years out of date), but little boys in suit-like clothing to me looks far more awkward than smart. It doesn't help that the quality of the fabrics is atrocious and given that they are children (and teenagers), they can very easily make it look worn and shabby all too quickly.

(Next arguements will be posted soon, feel free to challenge me on the points that I've made)

A'right, next point.
They are practical: I am flabbergasted by how anyone could think that. They are very uncomfortable garments (after all, they are essentially just cheap suit-like garments) except not nearly as comfortable as wearing a proper work suit (which I discovered from doing work experience last year). The jumpers especially are the kind of things from hell: itchy, ugly as sin and of course impractical (there are much thicker and cosier jumpers to be worn in winter and it is way too thick a garment to be worn in the summer). The shoes are hardly practical. I mean, they cost a crazy amount of money and must be worn everyday (and when given the very poor quality of them, they'd tend to fall apart within a year or so, make that six months for a particularly rough kid) I never really had any problems with walking in them, but some of my friends with less than perfectly straight feet weren't so lucky and they would have been better served with good runners/shoes (for runners €25 and up, for shoes €150 and up). Except that it can be very hard and costly to take care of these pricy shoes since you have to wear them everyday, whatnot? Many people don't have the resources/time to have to deal with this nonsense. And god help if you got your jumper torn or lost your school tie, in those cases, no education for you!

So it's pretty obvious from the explaining given that uniforms are anything, but practical and bring about loads of unnecessary grief among students.

Anyway, I'm going to stop it about there and give some advice as to how to take advantage of both the positives(however few) and negatives of uniforms.

1/. The best way about this is to actually attempt to educate students about making informed choices with their clothing choices/discretionary expenditure as a whole. This would obviously be really difficult to do, but doing this right, by making the lessons engaging and relevant, could definitely reduce clothes bullying among peers. Personally, in my new school with no uniform/dress code policy (or what you call sixth-form), I have never witnessed a single incidence of clothes bullying and this is in a very affluent Dublin area with LOTS of D4s so it really can't get any worse than that! But if it does come up, try using this method first.

2/. No brand dress code. This is quite simple really. No clothes with any major imprinting of brands (with the exception of shoes, own-branding and such) on clothes. You could extend this to really expensive runners (>€150) if that becomes a problem. But what is wrong with doing that? That mitigates the peer pressure surrounding clothes AND allows you to have a reasonable level of creativity with the clothes. Forget about this "smartness" thing, these are children/teenagers going to SCHOOL not to a funeral. It should be every bit as casual as going to the park/cinema/etc.

Reply 51

cf_99

Sorry about the late reply, had another point prepared, but got erased since I'm typing it from an IPad. Oh, it actually did get through, okay then.

Yeah, sure ties look smart, that is if your holding down a position in an investment banking firm or law firm. I've nothing against them as garments. I loved being able to wear them during my work experience since I got to wear GOOD ones that looked smart and was SUITABLE for the job.

Ties are not suitable for a school setting. Especially not on children/teenagers that either hate them with a passion or get brainwashed by the stupid "school pride" crap that administrators love to shove down their throats. Either way, they just look wrong and the very fact that pupils don't tend to like them makes their application to the school setting even more ridiculous.

(Sorry for the bad phrasing, English has never been my strong suit, haha)

(edited 5 years ago)

Reply 52

Chris522

I wear my school tie and blazer 5 days a week and feel proud to wear it. The other school I'm my area changed to polo shirt and I think it looks naff. I woukd never change to a crap uniform like that

Reply 53

connor.beja

I hated mine, not because I don't like uniform in general but because it was awful. Uncomfortable, looked untidy, and the rules were stupidly strict. My friend wasn't allowed to have her hair shaved, but as a boy, I was. Girls could wear skirts in summer, boys couldn't wear shorts. We had to have specific socks with the school crest on them, but if for whatever reason you didn't have them (couldn't afford them, waiting for them to arrive in the post etc.) then wearing different plain socks would get you a detention, as would not wearing socks at all. Had they been a bit less army-like in their rules, and had the uniform been smarter and more comfortable, I wouldn't have had any problems.

Reply 54

Chris522

Original post by connor.beja

Is a blazer and tie uncomfortable or would u rather a cheap tacky polo shirt

Reply 55

connor.beja

Original post by Chris522

Is a blazer and tie uncomfortable or would u rather a cheap tacky polo shirt

I've experienced both, and they were both terrible. The polo shirt was itchy and the shirt was sweaty and uncomfortable. People loved to grab hold of your tie and strangle you with it, too, so I'm not a fan of either.

Reply 56

Chris522

Original post by connor.beja

Just coz some idiot grabbed ur tie don't mean we should be made to wear polo shirts sorry. I like my uniform. I wear it with pride for my school and after school I keep it all neat. Don't see issue in that

Reply 57

Chris522

Original post by Chris522

I would hate a casual polo shirt uniform

Reply 58

cf_99

I wouldn't really care whether it's polo shirt or shirt/tie, both are equally horrible. In my old school, there was a summer uniform (polo shirt) and a winter one (shirt/tie). I actually preferred the winter one since the long-sleeved shirts made the horrible itchy jumpers a bit more bearable. And I'll have to admit that it looking smarter is another good thing about it too. My school was actually quite reasonable with the uniform rules (we could wear whatever socks we wanted for instance). But my arguement was not necessarily directed at my school since its rules were (just about) bearable. It's targeted towards Irish (and British) schools in general, the ones where not having hair that is too short leads to an automatic suspension, the ones where you aren't allowed in the building due to some rip in your jumper, the ones that actually mandate what clothes your supposed to wear going to and from school(even shoes), the ones where no jewellery or hair dye is allowed whatsoever, the ones that mandate that the uniform be bought from a specific retailer (my school had that, grrr). Those are the kinds of schools that, by right, should be taken to court for what is clearly unfair treatment towards students. And it is appalling that there are a considerable number of schools in Ireland that have those rules. And then principals wonder why truancy and disrespect are all too common in schools here, it's because they're not getting the required level of respect back!

Anyway, that's enough talking for now. I just had to let that out since I've never actually gotten to express my views on the matter before. For me, the whole problem is that it disrespects the students.

Reply 59

illicitfinesse

Original post by Chris522

What is people's view on school uniform. I personally really like my uniform. I wear blazer, white shirt, school tie, black trousers, black shoes. We also have a school polo shirt but I never wear that as I think it's not real uniform. I also usually keep my uniform on at home, I don't even loosen the tie as u think it's comfortable and smart.

I like wearing uniform because I think it keeps everyone equal. At my sixth form, you have to wear the regulatory school skirt but can wear whatever type or colour of sweater you like which is kind of nice, I guess.