Guidance on school uniform and clothing has been published today by the Scottish government.
It stresses that there will continue to be no legal requirement for pupils to wear school uniform. However, the guidance includes key principles that are expected to be applied in all schools.
These include that school uniform and clothing policies should:
- Be informed by pupils’ views, but also those of parents, carers, teachers and other school staff.
- Minimise costs - for example, “branded items of uniform and blazers should not be compulsory, nor promoted or encouraged by schools”
- Commit to fair and environmentally sustainable approaches.
- Support an “inclusive, welcoming and equitable school culture”.
- Promote equality around belief, race, disability, sex, sexual orientation, gender reassignment, and pregnancy and maternity.
- Remove barriers to pupils’ participation in school.
- Apply to all school clothing, including PE and the senior phase (years S4-6 in Scottish secondary schools).
- Take a practical approach around, for example, weather and “seasonal needs”.
- Encourage pupils to observe school uniform and clothing policies, while recognising their individual needs, circumstances and identity.
The NASUWT Scotland teaching union has welcomed the guidance - particularly “the focus on ensuring uniform rules help promote equality and the inclusion of all pupils” - but said that “stronger action is also needed to tackle the rising cost of education”.
Call for legally binding school uniform rules
Mike Corbett, NASUWT national official for Scotland, said: “It is disappointing that at present this guidance is not statutory so there is no obligation on schools to follow it.”
However, he noted the Scottish government’s intention to review this statutory status and urged ministers to do so as soon as possible “so that there are legal powers to compel all schools to do the right thing by pupils, families and carers”.
The guidance was welcomed by Dr Rachel Shanks, a senior lecturer at the University of Aberdeen school of education and director of social inclusion and cultural diversity, who in 2020 published research which found that almost a fifth of state secondary schools in Scotland specified an exclusive supplier for school uniform.
She said: “This is the first guidance on school uniform in Scotland and provides clarity about what can and also what should not be expected in terms of what pupils should be asked to wear at school.”
Dr Shanks praised “greater clarity” around affordability and the expectation of making “pre-loved” school clothing available. The guidance was also “a positive step forward in terms of recognising children’s rights following incorporation of the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child”.
School uniform ‘uncommon’ in other countries
Mark Priestley, a professor of education at the University of Stirling, tweeted that the new guidance was “largely sensible, despite starting with the unsupported assertion that uniforms improve school ethos”.
He added that, internationally, “school uniforms are uncommon and even non-existent in most education systems, including those touted as high-performing”.
Education secretary Jenny Gilruth said that the guidance “makes clear that schools are expected to do all they can to limit school clothing costs for families as part of our wider aim to reduce the cost of the school day”.
It also “encourages schools to develop flexible and inclusive policies which promote generic items of clothing and do not include compulsory branded items, supporting our efforts to be more sustainable”.
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