School Uniforms

One of the questions asked at the May 17th candidate forum was, “Do you think uniforms should be worn? Why or why not?” We were given only two minutes to answer on Thursday, and we only had room for three sentences in the follow-up article that the Plaindealer was good enough to print the next week. I promised I would answer the question more fully on this blog.

Personally, I don’t think our students should be made to wear uniforms. If I recall correctly, only one candidate, Terry Stacy, strongly favored school uniforms. He said that in the past he had actually asked the school board to require our students to wear uniforms. He felt that uniforms would make it easier for teachers to identify intruders, and he inferred that it would eliminate the problem of students being beaten up for their Nike footwear. My views differ significantly.

First of all, unless we also required standardized shoes, I think many students would continue to wear Nikes. Moreover, I’m not aware of any Choctaw County student ever being beaten up in order to have his shoes stolen off his feet. I know such things happen in Los Angeles and New York City, but most of us choose to live in Choctaw County because that type of thing doesn’t happen around here. If ever it does, swift and severe disciplinary action will put a stop to it.

In regard to identifying intruders, I guess uniforms would help spot someone who was improperly on campus with innocent motives. An intruder who was on campus and planned to do harm to our students, however, could surely obtain a uniform from the same source that our own children got theirs. Evil doers have a long history of obtaining police uniforms, military uniforms, pilot uniforms, etc. in order to commit their crimes. I just can’t believe that it would be harder to get a Choctaw County school uniform than to get a policeman’s uniform.

During the candidate forum I pointed out that requiring uniforms would add extra expense to family budgets already strained by rising gas prices. Mr. Stacy said that wouldn’t be the case because parents had to buy clothes for their children to wear to school anyway. That only makes sense if you think our kids are going to wear their school uniforms around the house, hanging out with their friends, and to church on Sunday. Parents are still going to have to buy the clothes kids like to wear at these times in addition to school uniforms. Also, how many teenage girls do you know who are willing to wear the same blouse two days in a row without washing it? Moms are going to be washing clothes every night or else they’ll have to buy several uniforms per child.

Perhaps the biggest reason I wouldn’t require school uniforms is because I take Jesus’ admonition to do unto others as you would have them do unto you very seriously. I would have hated wearing a uniform when I was in school. Clothes and image are important to our kids, and I don’t think we should take that aspect of their childhood away from them just to make our jobs a little easier. I feel that an effective, enforced dress code can take care of any problems that students’ clothing might cause.

That said, the major theme of my campaign is to give the public more say in how our public schools are run. Therefore, if the majority of parents wanted uniforms, I would not oppose them. But if I got to cast my one vote on this issue I’d say, “No, let the kids be kids.”

Until next time, may God bless you and your children.
Bob Mamrak