School Uniform

A light hearted blog today. As term is well underway, I was interested to see many of the uniform debates resurfacing. This time, the focal point appears to be girls and their skirt lengths. Most of the comments came from teachers and heads but there are some interesting comments from young people themselves at:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/14803993

Personally, I have always been agnostic about uniforms, having suffered some terrible ones myself as a child, but also having been to schools that did not require them. Most of the pros and cons rehearsed by both sides of the debate are familiar, and so I won't repeat them here. Looking briefly at the research, the most convincing I can find for the pro camp is Draa at Youngston State University in the US who looked at 64 public high school in Ohio in terms of attendance, graduation etc. She came to the conclusion that in those schools uniform did help attendance, graduation and suspension rates. There are of course many reasons why this should be the case, but interesting nevertheless. As I go about the country, I do see teachers spending a great deal of time enforcing uniforms, which may well be the reason why heads now feel they have to ban skirts. It saves all that bother and time enforcing rules about length. (I notice St Trinians kept its uniform with no attempt at enforcement..!)We know that adolescence is all about identity and challenging values of those in authority. Some do it subtly, some roll up their skirts or have something pierced. Fashion editors know that clothes are about much more than covering the essential- they speak of ourselves, our backgrounds and our future. One of the strongest pro arguments is about helping children fit in from poorer backgrounds, but I suspect teenagers are savvy enough to do this without the clothing clues.Are those non uniform days at schools when money is raised for charity really different to the norm?

A strange thought did occur to me whilst thinking about this whole issue though. Does it help as to dress better as a nation to treat uniform in the way that we do? Is there a link between between well dressed, like, say, the Italians, and less uniform at school? I would be interested in people's thoughts.