Do school uniforms impact the student's learning or not? Many people are divided over how much of an impact that school uniform have upon the student. Researchers at the University of Nevada, find out that the vast majority (90 percent of students) reported that they disliked wearing uniforms. However, other data showed more nuanced results. For instance, 54 percent of students agreed that they still had their identity while wearing a uniform, and 50 percent agreed that uniforms saved their families money. But only 41 percent of students agreed that there was less gang activity at their school after uniforms were required. Meanwhile, most of the schools believe that uniform policy encourages children to focus on their studies rather than their clothes, many people also think that school uniforms have no positive effects on the students for several reasons.
First of all, school uniforms restrict the student’s freedom to wear what they want. Many students do not like the idea of school uniforms because they can not freely express themselves. If the students want to wear sweatshirt or jeans, they have the right to wear it. If they want to wear pink or green every day, it should also be their right. As long as it does not distract others, or is harmful to the learning environment, kids should be given the right to express themselves. An example of student and parental reaction to school uniforms is found in the state of New Hampshire. A student in an online protest wrote, “A school uniform takes away individuality. Also, it will not change study habits of students. It means too much money needs to be spent for each child. Parents do not have that type of money, especially in this economy. We have the right to freedom of expression and would like to keep it that way and it is my right to wake up in the morning and have my own unique individuality.”
Secondly, school uniforms do not improve attendance, exam results, or behavior. Wearing school uniforms do not give effects at all to the student's learning in school. How neat or how tidy they dress does not mean they are a diligent student. In fact, the students think that uniform is a distraction. Teachers spend time and energy policing uniform when they should be teaching. They hand out detentions and sometimes ask girls to kneel on the floor to check the length of their skirts. Thus, will reduce the time for the students to study in class and distract their focus. The students can even feel lazy to attend class because of the obligation to wear uniform neatly. A 2010 study in a large urban school district in the southwest found that asking students to wear uniforms did not result in any change in the number of suspensions for elementary school students. In fact, middle and high school students experienced a significant increase in suspensions.
Finally, the last reason is school uniforms can be burdensome for parents. School uniforms can emphasize the socio-economic divisions they are supposed to eliminate. According to the Children's Society (UK), almost 800,000 pupils go to school in poorly fitted uniforms because their parents can not afford new items. A lot of parents spend much money to buy uniforms for their kids when they can use it for more important necessary. School uniforms require a lot of money. Public schools in Indonesia have four different pairs of uniforms that the students must possess. For example in high school, the students wear a white shirt and white pants or skirt for Monday, white shirt and gray skirt or pants on Tuesday until Thursday, Batik on Friday and scout uniform for Saturday. We can imagine how much money the parents must spend, not to mention how expensive it is for a uniform while they must buy four different pairs.
In conclusion, school uniforms give no positive effects at all to the student’s learning.
School uniform can restrict the student’s freedom to wear what they want, does not improve the student's academic and is burdensome for parents. Therefore, school uniform policy must be deleted because it does not matter what clothes the students wear to school as long as it is polite and does not disturb the learning process.
Source : https://yourstory.com/mystory/853190cbc4-should-school-uniforms
Picture Source : https://www.pexels.com/id-id/foto/sesuai-orang-orang-masyarakat-rakyat-3420517/ Patrick Case