Support for school uniform appears to remain widespread among teachers and heads, after a snap Twitter poll by Tes Scotland found 84 per cent of voters backed it.

However, after the Scottish Parliament heard concerns about the cost burden for families of unnecessarily elaborate uniforms, a University of Stirling curriculum expert has now said that uniform is more about control than education.

School uniform came under fire from responders to the poll - for wasting the time of the senior management teams, suppressing individuality and creativity, and burdening poor families.

The University of Stirling’s deputy dean of social sciences, Professor Mark Priestley, responded after MSPs investigating the effects of poverty on learning heard that “unnecessary fripperies”, such as piping on blazers and intricate logos, were pricing out disadvantaged pupils; in one school, Tes Scotland learned, the cost of a blazer badge and piping alone was reportedly £40.

Professor Priestley said: “Claims that uniform improves school ethos have little basis in research and can be seen as little more than assertions.”

The Education Endowment Foundation similarly finds that research suggests uniform by itself has “very low or no impact” on attainment, and it is a similar case for behaviour and attendance.

Professor Priestley - who is not against dress codes or more “functional” uniforms - also dismissed another popular argument: that uniform prevents a “fashion arms race”, as one teacher put it. He said: “This argument has always seemed to me to be a post-hoc justification in schools that already have uniforms.”

‘It reinforces elitism’

Online comments on the Tes Scotland poll were split fairly evenly on the value of school uniform. One said: “It’s a distraction. Reinforces messages of privilege and elitism when blazers, badges, braid and Latin mottos are involved. Why emulate these values in a comprehensive system?”

But another commenter said: “As long as the policy isn’t overly strict and uniform is affordable, I’ve never seen a convincing argument against uniforms.”

Uniform is an emotive issue, said Donald Macdonald, head of one of the few Scottish state schools in which pupils are not expected to wear one: James Gillespie’s High School in Edinburgh.

In his previous school, however, Mr Macdonald introduced a uniform as part of efforts to drive up disappointing attainment levels by changing the school culture and pupils’ attitudes to work.

“In that context, I felt that youngsters being prepared for a business day, for a working day, was important when it came to changing the ethos of the school,” he said.

Mr Macdonald, however, believed that we were on the cusp of a more relaxed era, and that within a decade things will “swing towards a non-uniform approach”. He added: “With increasing awareness of personalisation and individual rights, it will become much harder for schools to insist youngsters dress in a certain way.”

Amanda Corrigan, director of student experience at the University of Strathclyde School of Education, called for schools to ensure mandatory uniform does not cost more than the clothing grant that less well-off families receive.

This is an edited version of an article in the 11 May edition of Tes Scotland. Subscribers can read the full article here. To subscribe, click here. This week’s Tes magazine is available at all good newsagents. To download the digital edition, Android users can click here and iOS users can click here.

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