Our school board just voted to require uniforms!

[Liberty Belle]

I am just sick over this. I spoke out against it, but the right-wingers controlling the Grossmont Union High School District ignored opposition to unanimously approve a "Dress for Success Uniform Policy" at Grossmont High, our daughter's public high school.

There is an opt out clause (required by law), but our daughter feels intimidated to opt out of "dressing for success" even though she hates the uniform idea. I am so sick of fundamentalists poking their noses into every aspect of our lives lately!

Thank God the district is too broke to buy new text books, or I'm sure the kids would be learning Creationism instead of science by now.

DFAers, we have GOT to get good progressives to run for local school boards. Any liberals who want to run against these bozos, please move to La Mesa!

:mad:

[nothingshocksmeanymore]

1. La Mesa is going fundy?

I figured parents would vote for uni's out there A) to avoid gang attire and B) to avoid paying for wardrobes for the schoolyear.

[Liberty Belle]

3. The main argument for the uniforms was

that the administrators are tired of trying to enforce the existing dress codes. They are shocked, shocked, when a girl raises her arms and they are forced to see a (gasp!) belly button.

We don't have any gang violence problems at this school. As for the wardrobe costs, I will have to shell out a bundle now when she has a closet full of perfectly fine clothes that she can no longer wear to school.

[OrwellwasRight]

20. Liberty Belle, it is not so simple as that:

I went to school in that district, and subsequently taught there for five years. It is not merely "a belly button when a girl raises her hand." It is backless tops, strapless tops, g-strings showing over the tops of jeans, butt cracks, pants so low you can practically give the students a gynecological exam, boxers hanging out above pants and below shorts, you name it.

And, while your daughter may not be part of the problem, imagine trying to keep the attention of (much less teach) a classroom full of 40 students (at least half of whom are hormone enraged boys) when many of them are basically wearing underwear.

Granted, if they had implmented a dress code when I was a student, I would have been out there circulating petitions and speaking before the school board because that is my nature, and I would have seen it as an assault on my freedom.

As a teacher, though, I gained a new perspective. A lot of parents just don't parent anymore. And if they want their kids to come to school wearing outfits so racy I would be embarrassed to wear them into a club, then perhaps it is not so bad that a uniform will be enforced.

Incidentally, uniforms are a boon to students from families who lack high incomes. They don't feel that their poverty is as much on display--and that is a good thing.

[shanti]

24. i totally agree

unfortunately, my son's school doesn't require uniforms. i would love it if they would! it would SAVE me a bundle of money!

[Maple]

2. What do uniforms

have to do with fundies? I wore a uniform in school, and I assure you religion had nothing to do with it.

Good idea. No fashion parade, no 'keeping up' fashion wise, no killer bills, no gang colors...the emphasis is on your mind, not your body, your wallet, or your 'hipness'.

[Liberty Belle]

4. I have no problem with a private school wanting uniforms.

A public school, however, should not have the right to tell me what color or style clothing my kids can wear. How you dress is a form of expression--ie, free speech. Of course the fundies want everyone to look and think alike. God help us if kids actually learn some individualism and free-thinking instead of conformity.

As for test scores, the studies I've seen found that they went DOWN not up after uniforms were forced onto public school kids who didn't want them.

Our board, by the way, was taken over by right-wing fundamentalists a while back, and the balance got worse in the last election. The same board has been in the news before for going after diversity/tolerance for gays in the schools. Some favor creationism in science classes, I'm told. This is probably just the first step, though it's being presented as a proposal that originated with students (kids of fundies).

[Maple]

7. Yes, your school does

have that right. Otherwise people could well show up nude and fight all day...or do other things. There do have to be some rules.

And if parents can't figure out that bellybuttons are for beaches, not classrooms, then a dress code is in order.

The kids conform in their 'latest' fads. At great expense. What they don't do is develop their minds. That's where their character and identity are, and their individualism.

You've all complained about the 'dumbing down' of America...well perhaps it's because there's too much of a fashion parade, and too little academics.

If your school has been taken over by fundies, I'm sorry for that, but lots of schools have uniforms without religion ever entering into it.

[el_gato]

11. you've expressed this same mentality regarding the global economy

just bend over and take is the basic sentiment you are pushing

maybe it's a product of your schooling?

[el_gato]

10. that's one of the dumbest things I have ever heard

enforced uniformity is a good thing!

so much for the freedom of the individual, it's much better
to inculcate children with group think and passive acceptance of
authoritarian control than to let kids wear what they want. hell,
otherwise these kids might learn to think for themselves and how
would we get them blindly follow their leaders if they started
doing that?!!

[Sandpiper]

14. The purpose of Public Schools has become

To teach children to be dutiful consumers, good little cogs in the capitalist machine, and to do whatever they're told by their leaders.

Uniform dress codes help facilitate this, especially teaching them to do what they're told and not make waves.

[OrwellwasRight]

22. Uniforms facilitate being good little consumers?

Are you serious?

Uniforms are generic. You don't need a new one every six months because the heels get spikier or chunkier, the pants don't go from pegged to flares or from waist high to hip high, the skirts don't go from floor length to mini.

The opposite of what you said is true. When is the last time you were in high school? These kids are slaves to fashion, which means that they are already good little consumerist soldiers, cogs in the capitalist machine.

The best thing we could ever do for them is to get them to rethink the need to follow every single fad promoted on the Real World. The more people are accepting of plain vanilla, generic products, the less manufactured waste there is.

Think about the tons of perfectly good clothing that gets dumped in landfills every year simply because it is out of style. And yes, I mean landfills, not everyone gives their hand-me-downs to the Goodwill.

And I'd rather make waves (and have my kids make waves) by political action, not by shocking people with my backless shirts.

[OrwellwasRight]

21. That's a little simplistic.

Kids are only in school about 6 hours a day; they still have the freedom to wear whatever they want the other 18 hours of the day.

Moreover, I would want my child to actually learn to BE a free thinker, not to look like a free thinker based on her choice of outfit.

Choosing your clothes does not necessarily have anything to do with learning to think for yourself. If it did, then public schools with no uniform policies would not produce fundamentalist kids. Yet, miraculously, they do.

There are a lot more issues that you are not considering: getting kids to focus on studies, not sex; getting rid of clothing that can be used as a threat (such as certain colored shoe-laces which are used to signify gang or white-supremacist membership); helping kids not feel inferior because they can't afford Lucky jeans or Coach shoes; this list goes on.

[Name removed]

16. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Sandpiper]

5. Uniforms are a tool to destroy identity

That's why administrators are so fond of them.

[Maple]

6. Your identity

becomes stronger actually...it comes from your mind, not your clothes.

[Sandpiper]

8. Delete

[mitchtv]

9. 12 years of uniforms( actually 11 1/2)

didn't damper my individuality- Got expelled in senior year.I Loved Pub School, I had covered all the material already, never opened a book

[Sandpiper]

13. Maybe not, but consider

What institutions have a special fondness for uniforms:

1) The Military
2) Prisons

It's just a hunch, but I don't think they use uniforms to promote free thought or individuality.

[mitchtv]

15. also hospitals, labs

sports teams restaurants. My partner had a uniform shop not all of his customers were fascists.

[shanti]

25. it's also a great equalizer

no more designer clothes necessary. kids have lots of time to express their individuality after school. also, there are other ways to do this besides clothes.

[Momgonepostal]

12. My Dad went to San Diego HS back in the 30's...

...and they had uniforms then, too. He said it came about because they were such a huge variation in income and therefore wardrobes between students. They did it as sort of a clothing equalizer.

He said some of the rich girls used to wear furs to school. :eyes:

[yurbud]

17. Community college boards need help too

Right now, most are filled with chamber of commerce types who use it to get campus building contracts for themselves or their friends.

Most instructors are forced to work part time and don't have health insurance.

[haele]

18. I agree - we do have to get some good progressives -

especially since the major "non-denominational" Church Corporation (Shadow Hills?) owns the Grossmont School district. The issues of what form and how much education is happening in the schools needs to be addressed. The poor quality of Civics, History and Science and the loss of many of the Arts and other elective programs in the light of tight budgets and NCLB is a serious issue.
However(IMO, at least - having a 13 year old stepdaughter who's been in and is soon to return to the Lakeside/Grossmont district) school uniforms are not really the battle - no matter how much we might like the children to be explore their individuality and be themselves in various situations.
Last year, Cassie spent way too much time being concerned how "she looks", and how cool she should look to be with her friends; especially the friend that seems to have a cool new outfit every other day. The peer pressure on how to dress is intense, and very few teenagers that age are strong enough not to be sidetracked or intimidated into falling into cliques and herds - especially those that have problems with self-esteem anyway.
Uniforms can ease some of that pressure during school hours, and also cut down on much of the bullying that goes on between the cliques. They don't have to be the typical parochial school shirt and tie and plaid skirt below the knee; many schools - including the school she's going to for the time being in Florida, are just going with non-name brand undecorated pants (jeans and khakis), minimal jewelry and makeup, and a plain shirt and/or plain colored t-shirt as their uniform. She loves it, and when she comes back in two weeks to live with us, she's indicated she wants to continue in a school with - even though she is artistic and tries to be as individual as she can be when she's around us. The modified Britney Spears and Gangsta wannabes intimidate the hell out of her and her friends during school - when they should be learning, instead of playing peer games.
After school, most children change into what they want to wear anyway.
I understand your concerns - especially if your child is a free spirit and knows what she wants to be. But a reasonable school uniform policy will allow children to be freer of the chance of being forced into social categories, bullied or ostracized; and that freedom does far more for their self esteem and being able to grow as individuals than the freedom to dress the way the media or their particular cliques or role models may influence them to dress.

It can also teach them that the way they dress does not have to define them as individuals. That clothing is not as important as personal traits and personal growth, and that even if someone is wearing a uniform, that they can always take that off and be themselves. They can learn that the uniform does not make the person, nor does it lend them any special powers or favors.

Just my two cents.

Haele

[OrwellwasRight]

23. Right on, Haele. nt.

[Bariztr]

19. Uniforms are just clothes

As someone who wore school uniforms for 12 years I can also say that they are not a drawback to the development of an individual identity. I find that being a "slave" to fashion probably has more detrimental effects than school uniforms.

Not having to worry about what trendy thing was needed on a daily basis has got to be a big relief because its not about who to impress or what you can afford.

Enjoy the simplicity of the uniform but don't give it more power than it actually has.