School skirts

Dodgy thread title but nevermind.

I see on the news that a school in Liverpool (I think) is at the centre of a controversy because the school is checking the length of girls skirts to make sure they're not too short with pupils saying it's humiliating.

Now every so often this crops up with someone complaining that a male teacher has told them it's too short and a man shouldn't even notice, or that a school tells pupils "it's distracting for the male teachers" (can any of the women or teachers on here confirm if they've ever know that actually be said?) and a variety of other complaints about them for whatever reason over the years.

Can anyone think of a single reason why schools don't just ban skirts completely and tell girls that they have to wear the same uniform as boys? Seems to me that it would solve a hell of a lot of moaning and complaining

 

Boys aren't allowed to wear shorts at most schools though despite the fact that they'd like to. Seems a bit discriminatory to allow girls to have choices for uniform but boys are ordered to wear trousers.

 

I’ve never known it said but I have known an all girls’ private school that measured skirts. Skirts were compulsory all year but the uniform changed between tights and socks depending on the term. They made them all wear straw hats for the walk into and outer school too (not relevant but I thought it was weird). After school the girls all instantly rolled their skirts up and put make up on the bus as further along the journey it passed an all boys school.

I don’t think they should be banned as they are cooler to wear in warm weather.

 

Think it was St Helens not Liverpool

 

No idea why boys are ever banned from wearing shorts, I literally don’t understand the thinking behind it. Unless maybe it’s because they are basically preparing for office workers and men may not be allowed shorts then but women would be allowed skirts. There’s so many other jobs in existence thought that that’s stupid.

 

You could wear shorts when I was at senior school but you’d get your legs whipped with nettles

 

The girls are being treated unfairly by being allowed to wear skirts? Ermm

 

You would have got your balls felt at by the pervy gym teacher at ours.

 

Did you mean Pym teacher?

 

Interestingly this has been our dinnertime discussion this evening! My daughter is at an all-girls school where the allowed skirt length is below the knee. Some of the Year 7 girls are so little it means that their skirts drag on the ground and generally impede walking. Trousers are allowed, but not everyone wants to wear them. The school enforces the skirt length rule pretty strictly, and the girls of course try to flout it as far as they can. I said that I thought that the below the knee rule was fair enough, as the girls will probably try to flout it by 10-15cm which will still look reasonably respectable, compared with the 10-15 flouting of an above the knee rule in my day, meaning they were all walking round in miniskirts. My wife on the other hand (who works in quite a rough comprehensive school) reckons it's ********, as there are so many more pressing problems in our education system that skirt length enforcement should be way down the priority list.

 

It’s absolutely bizarre to me that the leadership in many schools are obsessed with the uniforms their students wear. Is that tie a little bit crooked? Is that skirt 3cm too high?

Our schools are criminally underfunded and the staff running them are criminally underpaid, the state of the pupils uniforms are such a none-issue in the grand scheme of things.

 

Glad to know she's appreciated! Although as she only works Monday to Thursday, she's off the wine tonight as she had a well-deserved skinful yesterday!

 

Clary Mason, Wombwell High.