r/newzealand • u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 • 16h ago
Politics Goodbye forced branded uniforms
Labour has quietly signed the death sentence of the compulsory monopoly that uniform shops have on school clothes, and the upcharge attached logo’d (though not patterned) items.
I’m now 31 but I‘m still nursing a grudge against my highschool for openly banning branded reusable shopping bags from places like Supre due to receiving kickbacks from Postie Plus. No exaggerating, Peggy Burrows and her deputies at Rangiora High School (she is now principle of Haeata college) used to hold “uniform assemblies” at Rangiora High where we would be told at length that ONLY postie plus shopping bags were allowed because Postie Plus provided kickbacks to the school. Also banned were black puffer jackets (the school sold an $80 logo’d windbreaker and god-knows-how-much optional blazer), and the policy that year 13s could wear mufti was abolished just before I reached that in favour of instituting a second brand new uniform for year 12s and 13s. Instead of getting to our “optional year” and getting to not wear the most uncomfortable clothing I’ve ever been forced into, we had to shell out literally hundreds of dollars for new skirts, shirts, etc because the school now required parents to buy TWO seperate uniforms. Now that’s a money making scheme if ever I saw one.
Never mind the determination schools and parents have to crush any demonstration of individuality children might try to cultivate via their appearance, which I think is bad for our youth in a totally different way to placing unnecessary financial pressure on parents and giving kids yet another reason to not show back up for year 12 and 13, when many kids already don’t have to or want to be there. Which is especially effective if your parents are poor.
Why is it the death knell? Because ACT are also promising the same thing. Which means that IF both parties stick to their promises and National doesn’t go hard in negotiations on its “Parents making their own parenting decisions is bad” stance, regardless of the flavour of government that follows this election, requiring branded items at huge costs to parents will be banned.
Side note: this is why you should join your school board, and think about the parents who don’t have the same means to send their kids to school that you do when making decisions on that board. School boards are grossly middle class and also lack student representation of any sort (which especially at highschool should be the case — these kids are 16, 17, 18 even, and schools supply leadership opportunities and create entire leadership teams without actually giving kids the opportunity to meaningfully interact with the policy being made that primarily affects them). The rollout of compulsory uniforms in order to better fundraise for the school via muftidays and retailer kickbacks is hugely hostile to the sorts of parents who usually don’t sit on school boards. And of course, they are longstanding school community members and not parents who’ve needed to move around a lot (and therefore shell out for more uniforms).
I wont pretend I don’t ideologically hate uniforms on principle and in my ideal version of New Zealand they’d be banned fullstop, but it is with absolute glee that I read Labour’s promise to make uniforms equitable and accessible for all families. The comment about families getting through a costly Christmas just to be hit with back to school expenses including potentially thousands of dollars worth of branded uniform items (if you have enough children, especially at the secondary level where uniform item prices reach ridiculous heights) felt especially in-touch. I wouldn’t expect Luxon or any of his well-salaried MPs can possibly understand how much of a stretch that is for normal families.
For the first couple of years of my primary, uniforms were optional. Over the course of thirteen years of schooling, I watched uniforms go from entirely a parental preference to one secondary school requiring the purchase of two seperate uniforms across just five years of schooling.
RIP the uniform monopoly, you won’t be missed. Get fucked.
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u/AitchyB 16h ago
My daughter had some rapid weight gain due to medication side effects and the uniform blouse doesn’t fit her properly even in the largest size, I mean it fits her but is far too long and too big in the shoulders and sleeves. That and they haven’t had any stock of the largest size for about 3 months now so I can’t get her a spare. Despite uniforms being their whole business they don’t have plus size patterns, they just upsize all measurements so if you are fat and short you look like a clown. She’s about a size 18 in normal clothes but had to go up to 26 in the uniform to do up over her chest, absolutely ridiculous. So the expensive compulsory uniform is uncomfortable and not fit for purpose.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 16h ago
Ugh, I was a fat kid and the chafing that the summer dress (and later senior skirt) caused should alone be enough to make uniforms illegal tbh.
Pretty sure one of the arguments for school uniform is “kids that look different get bullied”. I promise we look different IN uniform as well, though.
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u/Medical-Isopod2107 16h ago
At one of my schools I had to get them to custom-make me a shirt because they expected every thirteen year old to be a tiny, skinny, 5-foot-or-less kid
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u/torolf_212 LASER KIWI 4h ago
I was a bit of a bean pole when I was a teen, and my shirts were always about level with the top of my shorts. I had to slouch to not show off stomach
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u/LittleRedCorvette2 15h ago
Your poor kid. I wonder if you can get the bigger size and go to a Taylor? It must be a hit to her self esteem.
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u/pepperbeast 5h ago
You probably can. And then you'll pay once for an overpriced, ill-fitting shirt, and once more to basically have it remade.
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u/PoodleNoodlePie 15h ago
Get the poor girl some wegovy if meds are doing this to her. Probably also cheaper than uniforms
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u/firefly081 9h ago
Several hundred dollars a month for meds is not cheaper than an overpriced uniform, and opting to give your kid weight loss meds that do not have extensive long term trials to measure adverse effects is an insane take. The solution is schools stop forcing hyper expensive garbage uniforms.
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u/murder3no 4h ago
I am pro uniform mostly because it eliminates the need to think about what to wear in the morning. However they should have a 'capsule' non gender based selection of items that are unbranded. Therefore girls have the option of wearing trousers or shorts if they wish. I remember when I went to primary school in the UK my mum getting my uniform from marks and spencer. All we had to get from the school was a tie and a badge for my cardigan.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 1h ago
Is that… a priority for us? Not making high school students think about what to wear in the morning?
Feels like a silly reason to have a uniform.
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u/murder3no 2m ago
Not necessarily however I do think that policing acceptable mufti clothes would be a lot more time consuming than policing uniform.
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u/kathja71 16h ago
School uniforms for girls also seem to be based around skirts and dresses. So impractical for today's girls/young women.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 16h ago
I stopped riding a bike to school because I was rural and bussing and had to wear a skirt/kilt, and while girls who lived in town could change in the school toilets, my bus arrived literally right before school started so there just wasn’t time. I can’t really ride a bike today like I could when I rode one everywhere, and I still resent the uniform policy forced that on me but not on boys.
I wish I’d just had the guts to show up in pants tbh. But kids don’t want to stand out like that, even when the alternative is awful.
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u/Sigma2915 15h ago
did you not wear bike shorts or something similar under the skirt? i think you’d have struggled to find a single student at my high school who wasn’t, unless they’d opted for the uniform pants instead. pervy boys and chafing were the only two reasons i heard more than “i cycle to school”.
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u/Medical-Isopod2107 16h ago
My intermediate changed the uniform the year we started to button-up white blouses and formal skirts (no pants allowed) then complained that all the girls sat around at lunchtime instead of being active
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u/absolutelythrowaway9 6h ago
My old high school used to allow girls to wear shorts as well, but then around the time i started they changed the policy so it was skirts only. Girls had to wear a button up blouse and boys had polos.
Recently checked out the website and was pleasantly surprised to see they changed the policy so that it doesn’t matter who wears what pieces, as long as it’s part of the official uniform.
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u/sugar_spark 15h ago
I went to an all girls school and while our formal uniform was a pinafore, we had shorts for our more casual uniform. They looked smart and were comfy and easy to wear. I don't know why more girls' uniforms don't include them.
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u/Zephyrkittycat 11m ago
As someone who went to an all girls school, it's also just plain sexist. We had to wear long wool skirts all year round where shorts or trousers would have been much better. But girls have to wear skirts.
There was also other rules like ties in winter, had to wear either a blazer or the shirt outside school grounds not just the jumper and a raincoat that was in no way waterproof.
My parents had to pay over $1000 for a uniform in like 2007 so I would hate to think what it costs now. Schools should have either no uniform or gender neutral generic uniform.
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u/silvergirl66 16h ago
I think it is a brilliant policy and could be a winner for Labour tbh. fully agree with your post OP. I remember the intense resentment I had as a single mother with two sons at high school when they changed the requirement for a rain jacket from a plain blue parka style which was perfectly wearable post school years, to the same garment with a school logo embroidered on it. My son was in his final year so I refused to shell out $90 for a new one when he had a perfectly serviceable one already. That lead to him having his formerly uniform jacket confiscated at school on a day when it was raining. I was livid!
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u/Medical-Isopod2107 16h ago
My intermediate school changed the uniform the year I arrived, then my high school did the same, then my high school did it AGAIN when I was in year 11, so there weren't even second-hand options for my family. My parents were pissed because of the money, I was pissed because the new ones were uncomfortable and looked like shit (though the high school ones at least were better than the intermediate ones), they went from polos and shorts/pants to button-up shirts/blouses and formal pants/skirts/etc. I really don't know what possessed any of them to think it was a good idea.
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u/ElDjee 15h ago
when i was growing up, i lived in a country that had a single uniform for all ages in all schools. it was ugly AF but it wore like iron and in addition to selling finished pieces, the department stores also sold bolts of the fabric.
while nobody liked the uniform, i don't think it did permanent damage to anyone's psyche (although it was decades before i voluntarily bought any clothes in dark grey).
what kills me here is how damn expensive the uniforms are, and how the only alternative to a single supplier seems to be to buy used.
i'm lucky because my older kid is super easy on their clothes, so they're in great shape when their younger sib gets them - who then proceeds to destroy them just by glaring at them.
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u/Emrrrrrrrr 14h ago
I loved wearing a uniform throughout high school. Could get up and dressed so fast, did not need to think about my appearance and clothes at all - it was so freeing! And I do think it was a social leveler. I went to school with some rich girls but it didn’t matter, everyone looked more or less the same, nobody knew if so-and-so had the latest jeans or heaps of outfits. And while some schools have expensive uniforms the schools my kids go to have cheap hardy uniforms that last forever - much cheaper than having to buy them fashion clothes honestly, and way less demands for ‘cool’ clothes. I am 💯 in favour of uniforms, wish I had one as an adult 😏
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u/Ashzera 13h ago
I'm glad you had a good experience with uniforms. There's definitely benefits, but I really hate the prices. At least the uniforms for your kids are cheap. The 3 public schools I went to all had uniforms more expensive than normal clothes, and so does my son's.
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u/Emrrrrrrrr 3h ago
I know some are crazy expensive, I noticed a school kilt that was $160 the other day 😮 I am guessing it’s wool, adjustable and supposed to last your whole time at high school but still - with all the items that is a hard swallow. Our high school items are all synthetic and like $50 each. Blazer is probably more but it’s optional and you can wear your own black jacket, scarf and hat.
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u/theinvisablewoman 4h ago
Same, i felt so relieved. We werent overly poor, working class perhaps, but my clothes were the reason i was bullied and a uniform changed that. I liked being just like everyone else, atleast during school hours.
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u/MercuryBeach_ 4h ago
I loved wearing a uniform during my hotel and casino days. Getting up and choosing work clothes each day is one of the most tedious things in life. Same as deciding what to cook each night 😅
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u/FergusTheCow 16h ago
Don't forget the enormous amount of teaching and learning time taken up by policing uniform.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 16h ago edited 16h ago
The uniform assemblies were the biggest waste of time I ever spent in school. My highschool LOVED assemblies, way too much, but at least academic assemblies were trying to impart on you the importance of studying and “girls only” or “boys only” assemblies were targeting gender issues or some shit. I can buy that revision is necessary to do well on exams. But despite the propaganda, I never did buy into the absolute imperative that was knee-high socks….
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u/Medical-Isopod2107 16h ago
Slight tangential but I still don't understand how anyone can support uniforms (at least in NZ as they are). The only arguments they ever have are "it equalises students" (it doesn't) and "it saves teens from thinking about how they look" (it doesn't).
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u/sewerratburn 14h ago
I’m a secondary school teacher here now but I grew up in the states. I still can’t get fully behind uniforms. I think mufti with dress codes encourages students to learn to make choices in what they wear to suit the scenario or environment they’re in. That being said, I do see it coming into play the argument of it being an equaliser. People did tend to in US schools make friends based off of who was wearing what, which sucked and I was just as guilty as others. Also there were times when I was in hs where I would’ve wanted to wear the same thing everyday because it’s easy though lmao
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 15h ago
Let’s spend 10% of our time fussing about what teens wear, that will stop them being self-conscious about their appearance!
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u/Endless63 15h ago
Wonder how much the schools got in kickbacks for forcing parents to buy overpriced uniforms from their chosen supplier. Whole thing is a scam..
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u/dullgenericname 15h ago
You must've been just a few years ahead of me! Finally year mufti stopped the year I started, and then was replaced with senior uniforms. I was straight uo afraid of the uniform police sue, as I hated the uniform so wore jewelery and non uniform things to feel a little bit myself. I despise school uniforms, and making us all wear dumb dresses when the year before I would never wear a dress.
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u/robbob19 4h ago
Not all uniforms are expensive. But when places like NZ Uniforms gets involved, they are. The kickbacks they give the school comes out of the parents pockets. When you walk into one of their shops with their minimum wage staff, you know you're paying for the owners boat.
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u/Fresh_Passenger_2744 16h ago
They should ban those god awful ugly ankle length kilts they make the girls wear whilst they are at it and let them wear trousers.
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u/Worth_Fondant3883 16h ago
Back in the 80's at least, I could buy my school uniform items from Farmers or similar. Once they started "branding" them and then limiting purchase to uniform shops, it became ridiculous. Self defeating to say the least.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 15h ago
My 67 year old aunt reminded me that uniforms and patterned dresses, cullotes etc are actually holdovers from a time when stay-at-home mothers made their own clothes, and it actually WAS cheap to buy the material and the pattern and make an entire family’s uniform for the year across a couple of days. Who in the modern world has the time or the dress-making skills for that? Somehow along the way it morphed into “$200 for a woollen kilt that requires quarterly dry cleaning please”.
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u/vixxienz The horns hold up my Halo 14h ago
When I was at school we had wool pinafores that were pleated. hideous things
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u/permaculturegeek 3h ago
Um, every high school has a student rep on BoT - it's required. Many schools have redefined uniforms to be more affordable. Ours allowed Canterbury shell trackpants as a senior option, and both kids kept wearing them after they left school.
I was one of two students who continued to wear uniform in 7th form (optional mufti) - it avoided showing up my small range of clothes options.
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u/ComeAlongPonds 3h ago
Same for 7th Form uniform wear. Back then if you were a non-scrappy student then it was quite durable. Also useful for 7th Form lunch pass perk, as teachers roaming town couldn't send you back to school.
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u/howannoying24 14h ago
It is bonkers to me that in 2026 we make a wearing any uniform more important than getting an education for many kids. If a kid doesn’t want to wear a uniform they should still be able to go to any public school they are zoned for. None of the arguments for uniforms hold up. And there is something weirdly gross and sadistic about the whole thing.
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u/InsanateePrawn 15h ago
Ayyyy another RHS survivor.
Peggy was the absolute worst person I’ve met, I was a student there when she first started as principal after Peter Allen.
I luckily finished that year but there was a lot of issues with her B.S at the time and the years following.
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u/not_all_cats 15h ago
My primary school was in a very poor area and we didn’t have uniforms. My kids primary school is in a good area and doesn’t which is so great.
High school uniform prices were atrocious when I was at school. Everyone I know bought basically one of everything, 2 shirts if you were lucky. Fun having to go and try and wash and dry your wool skirt when you got period blood on it. A classroom of teenagers with one jersey to wear week in, week out.
Not to mention, we were all freezing!
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u/MooIsNotAvailable 14h ago
I went to mufti schools and don't have kids so I've never had to deal with the cost personally, but I'm always shocked when I hear how much some of them cost.
When I moved to England I was surprised to discover that you could just buy school uniforms in regular shops which just made SO much more sense. Good call to bring that here.
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u/HaewkIT 13h ago
What is the election cycle for the school board? 3 years? Your kid is only at college for 5 years. How many parent representatives are on the board? How do you even campaign to get elected?
And how is that going to help when your school is on the North Shore where it seems most of the parents either think it is cute or don't care?
If you are struggling with the cost of school uniforms then campaigning to get elected to a school board is probably not making the list of priority problems you are dealing with and is just another stone around your neck.
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u/Sharp_Suggestion_752 16h ago
i remember at intermediate having uniform assemblies and we would just give any non uniform stuff to our teacher to hide for us if we happen to be wearing something non uniform.
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u/theolivesparrow 13h ago
When I was in school, you could wear any plain white blouse or polo shirt and they were $5-10. Now, sending my kids to that same school, we have to buy an almost identical blouse for $55 with a tiny logo on it. Absolute piss take.
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u/PRC_Spy Marmite 14h ago
Not a fan of school uniforms. I hated it when I had to wear it, and hated having to pay to put it on our kids.
A dress code is where it's at. We most of us have to dress to a code for work. Why not the same for school?
Make the dress code national with schools only differentiated by a badge on a jacket. Then those kids who change schools only have to change badge. Plenty of competition so prices go down. Easy to obtain hand-me-downs ...
What's not to like?
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u/bidderbidder 16h ago
Has that woman done anything good?
Schools are all contracted to buy only from those places. We are talking sports uniforms as well as school, even tiny little teams have to buy their stupidly expensive uniforms.
I have a side hustle of tshirt printing, very small time and local. I’ve been doing some small teams for the local school but it has to be very hush hush lest the powers that be find out about it.
So I can safely say that at least one school doesn’t agree with it at all, but they don’t have people like Peggy Burrows anywhere near their board or staff.
Hopefully this will mean they can let their contracts lapse and more small time printers can just chuck the school logo on a $10 kmart hoodie if ya want “uniform” - job done.
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 16h ago edited 15h ago
Yeah, she took heat from David Seymour for speaking out against the school lunch changes.
I’m no fan of Peggy Burrows (she’s a very divisive figure where I’m from lol) but I will begrudgingly admit she has her strengths. She stamped out a “school fight” culture fairly successfully while I was at Rangiora High, for example. Credit where it’s due and all.
But I’ll never forgive her for the way “final year mufti” was dangled as a carrot my entire school career just to be replaced with a senior uniform even shittier than the previous potato sacks. Maybe not her biggest sin but unlike her expense scandals, this one affected me directly lol.
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u/teelolws Southern Cross 15h ago
Why is it the death knell? Because ACT are also promising the same thing. Which means that IF both parties stick to their promises and National doesn’t go hard in negotiations on its “Parents making their own parenting decisions is bad” stance, regardless of the flavour of government that follows this election, requiring branded items at huge costs to parents will be banned.
Maybe. Even if it is left out of coalition agreements, that doesn't guarantee the bill will be introduced. Suppose National wins, the only way is for Labour or ACT to get a Member's Bill introduced. Thats a longshot. Basically a law lottery.
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u/GenieFG 15h ago
The biggest issue is the number of items - and it needs to include PE gear. One piece for each type of uniform should suffice. Those horrendous kilts should count as “branded” and there should be multiple places to buy items in standardised styles and colours. (This will be equally important so that a school doesn’t opt for unusual teal.) Two items could end up being expensive skirts plus a blazer or jumper - not much change out of $300 plus shirt, socks and shoes and PE gear - and that is what some schools will choose if given the option. By three items, it’d be back to skirt, jumper and blazer, and so it goes on. The devil will be in the detail whichever government implements it.
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u/laanalou 14h ago
I managed a high school uniform store. The prices are ridiculous for buying cheap ass Chinese crap. Such a total rip off for clothes that lasted weeks
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u/shaktishaker 13h ago
Good ol goon. Where they had students coming from farms that had snow, expecting parents to pay hundreds for jackets, and nobody was allowed thermals under their kilts.
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u/BiblionautNZ 12h ago
To get this change to go ahead Labour would have to be voted in. If the change went ahead because ACT was part of a coalition government then that would mean we have three more years of the coalition of chaos.
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u/mankypants 5h ago
We were able to wear mufti in last year of school and also had fund raising mufti days in lower years. I hated them. I dreaded those mufti days. The mufti days were a competition to dress up and I always could only wear the same one tired outfit I had. The final year was hell with every day bring pressure to wear something different. Probably where fast fashion got its roots. With uniform I fitted in, without I was ostracised. Yes uniforms are expensive, but they are a one off yearly cost, and they are quality and last. You can also buy the same items second hand at a fraction of the cost and they look excellent. My uniform was ugly as, but I loved wearing it. My kids now wear uniforms, and the routine of not needing to worry what to wear, makes things just a little easier for them.
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u/icyphantasm 1h ago
Yess. I have a child with eczema who has to wear a cotton shirt under their polyester blend uniform polo. Having better quality clothes for less than the cost of uniform gear will be amazing.
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u/gotfanarya 14h ago
School uniforms should be free.
I’m not against uniforms when poor kids get bullied about their clothes.
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u/kiwidebz 14h ago
Uniforms were invented to identify who to not kill on the battlefield. Their modern use is to control and enforce conformity and obedience so you can grow up to be a good little corporate drone, but also relied on as a social status marker (i.e. private school vs public school). I see no good reason for them.
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u/Traditional-Gas7058 13h ago
Went to Auckland University top economics competition awards last night with around 300 prize winners. Not a single mufti student.
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u/korutech-ai 4h ago
I think too many have lost sight of the fact that schools are meant to educate. They should be adequately funded by the govt to do that and teachers should be well rewarded for one of the most important roles in society.
The need for a uniform is completely unnecessary. It’s so out of step with modern society. Few places exist where suits are expected these days. We’ve thankfully moved on from all that BS.
Ban the uniform. Fund schools properly. Pay teachers what they’re worth.
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u/ShadowLogrus 10h ago
Well said. The school uniform rort is an old one and needs to go. Fucking high school mafia.
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u/DecentNamesAllUsed 16h ago edited 16h ago
This is where the Senior High School in Albany gets it right. Young people from year 11 to year 13 being allowed to experiment and express their individuality in their clothes. More high schools/colleges should follow their lead.
They were in the news recently because the Junior High in Albany wanted to compete with them for Year 11 to 13s and put an application in to extend up to Year 13 instead of only going from Year 7 to Year 10. I can imagine most young people who would have had their parents force them to stay at the Junior High instead of being able to go to the Senior High would have been pissed off at 3 more years of forced uniforms instead of getting to dress how they wanted.
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u/Jonaskin83 15h ago
Not only that, ASHS also lets kids have whatever hair styles/colours, piercings or tattoos etc they want.
It’s a great school.
Granted, my eldest went to AJHS which was great as well, but he’s really flourished at ASHS.
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u/ring_ring_kaching og_rrk 15h ago
Northcote College does a similar thing with their year 13s where they can wear mufti but "professional" not baggy sweats and oversized hoodies.
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u/Away-Panda-1555 15h ago
My private school in the early 2000's had a uniform that was more relaxed than most public schools. No summer / winter divide. Girls could wear pants and shorts. I think our school logo /colours got a bit of a tweak at some point but there was no policy to wear uniform with the most updated logo. It boggles my mind some of these uniform policies that still exist.
From the outside looking in, i would look at some other school uniform and be a bit jealous how smart and nice they looked. But if i actually had to wear i probably would have gotten tired of it pretty fast.
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u/ItsLlama 12h ago
ive always been of the mindset that uniforms should only be for schools and retail, and they should be provided by the employer or school as part of the fees associated. private school thats 30k a year the uniform better be part of that. public school as long as the kids aren't wearing swastikas, gang patches or controversial imagery anything should go
i dress to match the workplace and setting. somedays its a polo and dresspants, some days its a jacket and jeans as long as you are presentable i don't care if you have a logo on your shirt that says you are part of the building
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u/feel-the-avocado 10h ago
I loved my wairoa college uniform
Moved to Napier and absolutely hated the NBHS uniform.
Wairoa had a good quality polo shirt, shorts, pants, socks etc.
They also had polerfleece beanies, a couple of types of jackets etc.
They also didnt care if the girls wanted to wear pants but a skirt was avaliable - well before the equal rights movement and well ahead of any other school.
I dont like the black and yellow current uniform but 20 years ago it was a real nice smart looking navy blue and white.
Napier boys have these paper thin shirts, a woolen jersey that was more holes than jersey which neither could keep a student warm on a windy day, no beanie, etc. Absolutely terrible design because of some historical preference that never kept up with modern times.
I support any move towards a polo shirt and polarfleece jersey that is both functional and smart looking and not uncomfortable or itchy because of some stupid historic reason.
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u/Vicdustrael 7h ago
My school also changed uniform heading into my year 13. Previously year 13 was mufti but tidy black pant +white shirt, afterwards there was a new uniform for year 12, and another one for year 13 (so 3 total)! On top of that, they advanced class wore the year ahead. So my single mum would have needed a new uniform for me going in to year 13, and new uniform for my year 11 brother in the advanced class, and a new uniform for my sister starting year 9 who was unable to fit my hand me downs. And they were not cheap uniforms! I have vague recollections of $80 shirts at a decile 1 school? My mum ended up pulling my siblings out to go to a different school
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u/whitewolf20 6h ago
My school forced everyone to wear shorts all year round in all weather. Only once we reach year 12 & 13 were we granted the privilege of wearing pants
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u/Zealousideal_Bid_230 5h ago
My old school banned dickies shorts first, then pants, then just any black pants not from the school store. Our deans and deputy would walk up to students wearing pants and ask if they were (thin, see through) pants from the school store.
We even had our deputy come into our home room and give a little speech about having to buy pants from only the school shop and how cheap and affordable they were. They were $65 and $100. That is not affordable when you have to spend $40 alone on a basic shirt, $40 shorts, $60+ hoodie. Add up the fact you’ll need multiple.
My shorts got too small and there was no way I spending $40 on a pair of shorts that were that uncomfortable and I was never going to wear again. So I just bought some from warehouse.
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u/frank-talk- 4h ago
The inequity is stark, I agree with OP, making/enforcing affordability across the board is a step in the right direction. How quickly and unevenly children grow, spurts etc, the kids seldom ‘shrink’ aha. Thanks for calling political leanings ‘flavour’, also.
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u/MercuryBeach_ 4h ago
I’ve always thought every school should have the exact same pants/skirt/shorts option and differentiate themselves through shirt and jersey only. This would make things soooo much cheaper for every family.
My kid isn’t even on the spectrum (as far as I know) but she can’t stand the feel and sound of soft shell jackets and refuses to wear them so that too is a big pain in the ass
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u/Audreaya 3h ago
Primary School was mufti, high school has a summer uniform and winter uniform. The school never allowed you wear summer or winter uniform out if a set date and needed a signed note to permit that.
I am for uniform, it equalises what each student wears, prepares them for work uniforms, reduces "what do I wear" and also standardised what is allowed without a ridiculous dress code. I agree that uniforms should be made simple, in any school unisex items should be offered (this may lower production costs if was the norm for all). I like the idea of schools not being bound by a specific brand for the uniform, this is what drives the cost up-limited supply and high demand. "Plain white shirt that buttons at the collarbone, black straight leg trousers or short/skort" no brand needed, perhaps only a school logo sweater, blazer, jacket is offered.
I do not miss my winter uniform, the kilt and pin I loved it but fiddly to put on, the socks had to be navy knee high, the shirt was not any shirt it had specific neckline, the tie, the sweater on top of the shirt then if you are senior maybe a blazer(or no sweater) it was a daily never ending story.
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u/Lilivierre 2h ago
My high school, Linwood, had their uniform at Ballantynes!
Ballantynes is boutique and very expensive. I think the softshell jacket was almost $200 while I was there and there was no other jersey available. It was the jacket or no arm coverings.
When I first started, the shirts were also unisex so they didn't fit guys longer torso or girls who had hit puberty.
They changed the uniform when I was in my last year so I dont know if that one was ballantynes or not.
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u/Cat_Emphasis505 2h ago
Im fine with uniforms generally speaking, however what infuriates me is having to spend $25 for 3 pairs of uniforms socks just because they have a certain colour line in them. Why cant the kids just have white socks? Not only that but the pink tax we must pay as parents of girls that the skorts/skirts always cost $15+ more each.
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u/the_other_skier 2h ago
> No exaggerating, Peggy Burrows and her deputies at Rangiora High School (she is now principle of Haeata college) used to hold “uniform assemblies” at Rangiora High where we would be told at length that ONLY postie plus shopping bags were allowed because Postie Plus provided kickbacks to the school. Also banned were black puffer jackets (the school sold an $80 logo’d windbreaker and god-knows-how-much optional blazer), and the policy that year 13s could wear mufti was abolished just before I reached that in favour of instituting a second brand new uniform for year 12s and 13s.
Are you sure about that? I’m 32 and would have been in the same year or one ahead of you at Rangiora High and don’t remember any of this, the mufti policy was lifted 3 years before I graduated, (maybe 09/10?), and was told to the students who would be the first to not wear it when they started school. There was a blazer, but it was optional and there were very few people who wore it that didn’t have to. The puffer jackets was a thing of contention for sure, as was the whole skirts and pants debate, especially in winter. I’m not sure where the whole Postie Plus thing comes from, all schools would get a kickback from them as they provided uniforms for all schools in the area, and were definitely on the cheaper end of things. Take a look at the Catholic schools in Christchurch where they actually have a mandatory blazer at a cost of ~$300 (back in 2009) and could only be bought from the schools uniform shop
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u/Cultural-Lychee-5374 1h ago edited 12m ago
Yes I am sure about this. We were the first year that HAD to wear the uniform, the year before us had the option to but didn’t have to as they were the transition year. It didn’t take longer than five years to implement. I started highschool in ‘08 and year 13s wore mufti. Discussion of changing the uniform didn’t start until ‘09 and the decision wasn’t made until ‘10, with the designs picked and timeline implemented in time for ‘11 to have the option and the graduating class of ‘12 to have no choice. But when I say year 13s wore mufti, that wasn’t just Rangiora; Kaiapoi was the same, and as I was from Woodend and at the time we could pick between the schools, and it was known even to primary schoolers that year 13s wore their own clothes to school.
For that reason, I’m not comparing Rangiora, a rural school, to private and semi-private Catholic schools because that would be apples to oranges… Had Rangiora High tried to introduce a compulsory $300 blazer there would have (rightfully) been riots.
Idk what to tell you about you not remembering this. Maybe you just weren’t paying a lot of attention to it.
The Postie Plus thing comes from us being specifically told we could only bring in Postie+ totes.
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u/Careful_Square_563 12h ago
My child's secondary school doesn't have uniforms, and that was important in picking that school.
To hell with sexist uniforms.
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u/FidgitForgotHisL-P 14h ago
Fuck yeah.
I hate with a passion having to buy uniform pieces. My kid loves football, lives in football tops - I’ve got branded Man City stuff that is significantly better quality, and was much cheaper than the crap the sole-supplier uniform provider sells.
Schools can have a uniform, I understand some think it’s necessary to define the exclusiveness of their school this way. But make it generic pants and tops and sell a school tie.
THAT SAID we also need to address (and I doubt the parties have) why schools lock themselves into these single-supplier agreements. The funding they get from the kick back is a valuable source of cash for schools which are perpetually struggling. Maybe if they were funded better, they wouldn’t be relying on extra-donations-by-proxy from the parents.
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u/Chemical_Functions 11h ago
Just lose the uniforms altogether. The "they stop bullying" argument holds no water. It's just some historical vestigial remnant of the colonial days. The "it prepares you to dress for the workplace" argument also falls flat on it's face. Loads of good paying jobs these days have a standard "uniform" of jeans and a tshirt (or a hoodie in the colder months).
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u/kiwichick888 13h ago
I have thought for many years that school uniforms, and branded uniforms in particular, should be gotten rid of. There are so many parents who face a heavy enough financial burden with schooling, and life in general, that forcing them to spend (sometimes) hundreds of dollars just on school uniforms is criminal. I do think schools should have a 'dress code' like, black shorts, white socks, blue shirt, etc, but that should be it. If schools want students to wearing branded uniforms, they should supply them free.
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u/mamaleon1206 16h ago
The only good argument for uniforms to begin with was that they were cheaper and therefore an equaliser between the haves and have nots - now uniforms are way more expensive than the clothes kids actually want to wear there is no excuse.