School uniforms: We are back to the days of making children dress like adults of old. Why?

I didn’t much like my uniform in secondary school. For one, snot green is not a great colour on me, but mostly I hated that I had to wear a skirt. A big, uncomfortable skirt that the woman in the uniform shop promised I would grow into.

But alas, along came sixth year and I was still hoisting said skirt up every day and willing it not to fall down if I ran.

You see, uniforms were expensive and my parents didn’t have a money tree out the back garden, and tried to prioritise food, bills and the mortgage and stuff, so they tried to allow for growing room, thus unintentionally rendering my uniform even more impractical than it already was.

And then, to add insult to injury, we had knicker-type shorts for PE. The sort of shorts that struck fear into the heart of any adolescent girl at the best of times, but even more so when she had her period. The uniform itself was topped off with a cumbersome gabardine, that didn’t offer any heat in the winter, while a jumper, and formal shirt and tie that prepared me for a life of, erm, not needing to wear a shirt and tie, completed the look.

I am that deeply suspect Irish creature, a mother of an only child. It was by choice

---

‘Again, my pesky children failed to tell tales on their friends to their parents’

---

Age checks for social media aimed at protecting primary schoolchildren are ‘broken’, says Norma Foley

---

I took the ‘easy way out’ and gave birth by Caesarean. And yes, it was easier

---

But we got on with it and mostly didn’t complain (well, until someone got a newspaper column). Those were the days my friend, we thought they’d never end, when sometimes things didn’t make sense, but that’s just how it went.

Only now when you look at the madness of putting small children into formal uniforms with stiff collars, ties, slacks and skirts, and bothersome, sometimes itchy, jumpers, it feels those days really will never end. A pandemic swept the world, and changed many of our habits, including, for a time what children wore to school. When the ask of freshly washed uniforms to prevent the spread of Covid allowed a flexibility at some schools to alternate with wanton abandon between formal uniforms and school tracksuits, as parents struggled to keep on top of the laundry, meant an opportunity for common sense to prevail presented itself.

[ Junior Certificate results to be issues on October 18th, Minister says ]

But alas, in many schools, it was turned away.

The world became a less formal place, when it came to dressing anyway, and wearing trousers while attending a meeting was no longer deemed necessary – as long as the laptop camera was strategically placed. And while the return to the office has seen the return of pants, there’s a noticeable difference in the more casual nature of how we now dress.

Unless you’re a schoolchild of course, or more specifically a schoolchild who doesn’t have a tracksuit as the sole uniform. We are back to the days of making children dress like adults of old.

And to what purpose?

There are extra costs for parents who’ll often have to foot the bill for a school tracksuit or other sports attire for PE. And in what way does sitting in uncomfortable clothing help children to learn?

It’s not that I’m entirely against uniforms. I can see the advantages to them. As a teenager I emigrated to the US with my family. My school there had no uniform. “How fabulous” teenage me thought, until I became the butt of jokes because I didn’t have the latest brands or the coolest clothes and shoes. It’s an isolating place to be, on the periphery. And so I learned the grass is not always greener.

But what about the children with disabilities or additional needs who battle daily with the texture and general uncomfortableness of collars, ties and itchy jumpers? Those who struggle through the day on the brink of sensory overwhelm, or who perhaps are excused from wearing the uniform, allowed to wear a school tracksuit instead. A goodwill gesture that sees them standing out, clearly different from everyone else. Might a move to a school tracksuit for all remove this issue, and be the preference of most children anyway? We either want to be inclusive, or not.

Or what of the teenagers taking Junior Cycle and Leaving Cert exams, in the sweltering and infamous exam weather? The most important exams of their young lives to date. Is a little bit of comfort out of the question?

But on we go, stifled by tradition, preparing our children, small and not so small, for an adult life of er, not needing to wear a shirt and tie and itchy jumper.

Or trousers, depending on the camera angle.