Should Public School Students be required to Wear Uniforms?
The introduction of school uniforms for public school students is not a new subject in the national debate. In the past, public schools considered uniforms as the old and outdated trends, but recently many public schools have started to implement and enforce a uniform policy. The implementation of public school uniform policy is essential if public schools strive to improve in terms of academic standards of their students. Therefore, arguments for and against have been raised on requirements for public school students to wear uniforms.
Some of the possible benefits raised for public school students to wear uniforms are many including uniformity. Researchers found out that students behave well when they dress uniformly. Uniformity is one way of showing loyalty, honor and pride of one’s school. In addition, it enables students to work together as a team at their respective public schools. This is not much as to erase their individuality, but to engage everybody on the same level as far as image and dressing code is concerned (South Africa.Dept. of Education 7).
Uniforms provide safety of the students. They provide safety in a manner that due to high crime rates and gang violence, it is easier to determine a student passing along the place where crime or violence has occurred while going to school. Uniforms will save a student from being subjected to harassment or even worse, getting killed. Therefore, uniforms are essential because they unsettle such dangers, which some students might incur while on their way to school.
Uniforms give students the ability to concentrate on learning rather than concentrating on what others are wearing. Researchers found out that uniforms keep students at the same level thus avoiding other students not to feel inferior. They found out that uniforms avoid associated fashion costs subjected to fashion change and avoid stress on what to wear for another day. They are much better especially to poor students who cannot afford expensive fashions like their rich colleagues. They enable students not to waste time in the morning hours looking for a better fashion to wear on thus saving time for learning (South Africa.Dept. of Education 11).
It provides a more businesslike approach to learning and a sense of self-discipline. The image of professionalism, associated with having students participate in a school uniform program is a more of businesslike approach in the learning institutions. Uniforms enable students to realize that their business is to study but not to think of which expensive clothes to wear. Students can develop a sense of self-discipline that will help them in future especially in places such as offices. For instance, they will learn in future which clothes are official and non-official to wear when they will start working in offices.
Students who wear uniforms perform better academically. According to the research carried out in the National Guidelines on School Uniforms, it was discovered that many private schools performed well because of school uniform policy. It was then suggested that even students in public schools should start wearing uniforms. This was done after the advantages and disadvantages of wearing uniforms were compared and found out that, many public schools were not performing well. This was because students wasted a lot of time in selecting a type of fashion to wear (South Africa.Dept. of Education 14).
The arguments against them are the need for students to express their individual selves. Students expressing themselves have taken a sharp turn in the past years. Uniforms did nothing to improve the attendance or discipline and even did not decrease drug abuse within schools. The study found out that it affected students more negatively because they were not left to exercise their freedom on what to wear. Mostly, the adolescents seem to feel as if their freedom of expressing themselves has been stripped. They usually feel as if they are in jail when they are wearing uniforms everyday.
Uniforms are less exciting and harder to recognize where a certain student is located in the crowd. They are sometimes tiresome because students get bored of wearing one type and the same colors of clothes everyday. Others get uncomfortable of wearing boring uniforms that affect their learning. Consequently, it is hard to locate a student especially when they are in the crowd of students. This is because they all appear the same thus makes it hard even for a teacher to find a student easily incase he or she has made a mistake.
In conclusion, students should wear uniforms to create equality, safety and avoid fashion completion thus concentrate in learning. Arguments against school uniforms are fading while the positive reasons are promoting public school uniforms and gaining grounds. The argument against is losing ground compared to the benefits of the uniform policy. Nowadays, many public schools are mandating and enforcing school uniforms for their students because they create a sense of self-discipline. In addition, they require all students to wear uniforms in order to create uniformity. They encourage students to wear uniforms to avoid associated costs that might expense parents on fashions.
Works Cited
South Africa.Dept. of Education. National Guidelines on School Uniforms. Pretoria: Government
Printer, 2006. Print.
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