Scandrett 1

Jalen Scandrett

Mrs. Litle

English 121-002

14 April, 2017

Annotated Bibliography: Are School Uniforms Successful?

Part I

Statement of Scope

School uniforms are a big thing in a lot of the schools in the USA. There goal is to help

kids focus, save money for parents, and make them perform at a higher rate. The work cited

below all show evidence and give opinions and how school uniforms dont do any of the things

on their task list. There is many reasons why and studies that show why and also might change

some points of view. Plus the sources add in reasons why school uniforms are bad and really

help to show that letting students where normal clothes to school is actually way better.

With sources from Alison Happel, Charles Dewitt, Judy Park, and Dave Anderson I was

able to find tons of evidence to help me point my side out on this subject. To really dig deep and

see how uniforms hurt students in the short and long run even though they seem like a good thing

or harmless.

Happel, Alison. "Ritualized Girling: School Uniforms and the Compulsory Performance

of Gender." Journal of Gender Studies, vol. 22, no. 1, Mar. 2013, pp. 92-96.

EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/09589236.2012.745680.
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In the first source, Ritualized girling by Alison Happel it investigates the

significance of skirt wearing among middle and high school girls. Early critical theory is

what it begins with, which is basically the examination of society and study of it. Early

critical theory sought social transformation and emancipation through critiquing certain

material realities of human existence(Happel.) It was put into society as traditions or as

what is normal. It was ok back maybe 100 years ago but in todays society things are

different and people should not be in a category based on sex. The second page goes

on to talk about how the the biological basis of sex and gender need to be changed. In

society sex and gender is a reiterative practice. Through repetition and imitation the way

we see a girl is pretty categorical. And that goes for just about anything in society .It has

so many regulatory regimes that are present.

The source starts to get into expressing about the school uniforms.The main

thing it points out is the use of a skirt in the school uniform policies. The wearing of a

skirt has been categorized as ritualistic by how it has become a formal piece of

clothing. A lot of this section is Hall explaining the ideas of a man named Butler and how

he brings the term of girledto account for how, from birth, certain things are created

that uphold binary gender categories. Why should the girls have a dress code different

from the boys? This question is answered in numerous way and arguments to show

how the skirt wearing of school uniforms leads to ritualized girling.

Park, Judy. "Do School Uniforms Lead to Uniform Minds?: School Uniforms and

Appearance Restrictions in Korean Middle Schools and High Schools." Fashion Theory:
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The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture, vol. 17, no. 2, Apr. 2013, pp. 159-177.

EBSCOhost, doi:10.2752/175174113X13541091797607.

In the second source looks into effectiveness of school uniforms and how they

affect creativity in Korea. There may be other reasons for the lack of creativity in Korean

students but Park explores on how school uniforms are apart of this. To start, in a

recent study of thirty three countries found that Korea was the fifth most rigid society. In

Korea people tend to be self conscious of how they are seen by other people and

society and this makes it hard for people to be creative. For example all the way up to

1980 school uniforms were required by law. So the kids had no choice but to be dressed

in a strict dress code uniform everyday. Clothes is one of the biggest parts of self

expression and these people don't get to have this freedom in most schools.

Towards the middle of the source it speaks into the advantages of school

uniforms. They do reduce the visual difference of wealth between students, and could

lower the economic burden for clothes on parents. Also it helps students focus on stuff

other than clothing while at school. On the flip side school uniforms can also put a

economic burden on parents.An average student is not going to have a week's worth of

uniforms just sitting in there closet, so its very likely that parents have to buy new

uniforms for their child.

At the conclusion of the source it tells about how there is no evidence that

wearing school uniforms leads to better grades which is one of the big reasons on why

schools adopt this policy.

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Dewitt, Charles. "Impact of schooluniforms." Proquest.com. ProQuest

Dissertations Publishing,, 2016. Web. 16 Apr. 2017.

This source is a research that evaluates the impact of school uniforms on the

student's behavior and learning in multiple middle schools in North Carolina. It takes the

views of most importantly parents and teachers and also administrators. The goal is to

see if it affects the important factors in schools which are attendance, behavior, and

grades.

Two of the middle schools have a uniform dress code in use and the other two

middle schools don,t for the research. The stats about the middle schools with uniform

dress codes did not show that they do not have higher grades of better attendance rates

compared to the schools with no uniforms. Therefore you cannot assert that the uniform

schools with produce better students or have better attendance records. Also there were

no results of better behavior either.

The findings suggest that uniforms are not cost effective and have no significant

effect on school safety, attendance, or discipline. Which is contradictive to what

uniforms are put in place for. So school board officials should really look into why they

started to have uniforms and if they are actually effective because if not they should

look into adopting new, adjusting old, or taking the dress code away.

Anderson, Dave. "Top 10 Reasons School Uniforms Should Be Banned." Top 10

Lists | ListLand.com. N.p., 05 Apr. 2017. Web. 18 Apr. 2017.

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This source goes into detail about statistics about school uniforms and tells why

school uniforms are not good things. As of right now one in every eight american school

have dress code uniforms, and the rate is going up, and there is no real way they help

schools.

The first reason why school uniforms are bad is that they can be detrimental to

adult development. The path to being really who you are is honed throughout the years

of schooling. SInce you're not given choice on what to wear at uniform schools you lack

that decision factor that a lot of other kids get. When you finally get to choose and make

decisions about everything you do you are truly an adult. When kids who wore uniforms

all of there life get here you can bet it will have an affect on their decision making skills.

Clothing is considered as one of the means of building an identity and without the

freedom to choose what to where kids become undeveloped in this area.

Another thing clothing can do is provide self confidence. Wearing uniforms

makes kids not look as nice and this makes them feel it too. Having the same outfit on

as everyone else makes the students all look the same which makes kids point out

other things like weight, body types, and heights, which makes kids look at himself in

the mirror and feel down. They really affect self images and can cause more harm than

it's supposed to stop.

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Part 2

Are Uniforms Successful?

Sometimes things that are meant to help just make things worse even if it

doesn't seem that way. For me school uniforms was something I absolutely hated

growing up. I never saw the reason for them. I was a very shy kid growing up so one of

the few ways i expressed myself was through clothing but that wasn't always available

in school. Just about anywhere in the world school uniforms are used in a goal of better

grades or student performance, but these claims are false and uniforms take away from

individuality, creativeness and enforces unfair gender roles.

In society today one thing that has a heavy presence is caring what people think

about you. School uniforms make all the students look mostly the same so there really

won't be too much about that. So the economic difference between families won't be

seen as easily in the clothing of the children. The administrators in the education

department also feel that it will keep kids from getting distracted by the clothing, but not

getting distracted by the clothing can be harmful. Wearing uniforms can make everyone

look the same. Making other things show more like body type, weight, and height. This

can cause insecurities and can make kids have a bad self image(Anderson) .The last

reason school uniforms get put into place is they are to be know as to be cheaper than

buying regular clothing.

Individuality is something that is very important to me and should be important to

everyone. Knowing ourselves and having our own thing is essential.(anderson) As a kid

going through grade school I went to a charter school with a heavy enforced uniform

dress code. I really hated it and I would lose self confidence wearing it. I was a very shy
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kid all throughout my years and clothes was a way I could express myself. The uniforms

would take away from that and I feel would cause me to be a lot more anti social

because of my confidence not being as high as it could be. School uniforms are the first

thing that starts with turning kids into robots. The students are forced to wear a strict

dress code and they never like it either. One main point I want to spot out is the use of

skirts in uniforms for girls.(Happel) Making girls wear these is really putting unfair

gender roles on these women. Girled is what Happel said to describe how it forces a

girl to do or wear something that society put on them as something a girl does or is

normal for a girl. It is 2017 where you should be able to be whatever you want normal or

not and putting this into dress codes really restricts that.

Grades and overall performance within the students actually don't improve with

uniforms.(Park) So what's the deal with them? I feel that people never really saw why

we figured uniforms were successful. Previously, only private or more elite schools

wore uniforms. They look more fancy and that's how you could separate what kind of

student they were. So of course the private schools had higher grades and smarter

students because they were getting a better education.(Park) Public schools saw

private and higher up schools doing better so some of the public schools decided to try

it out and it doesn't make a difference on grades or test scores. (Park)I feel like this is

the most important thing when it comes to the goal of school uniforms. A research was

dont in North Carolina between four middle schools. Two wore uniforms and two did not.

A lot of research and evidence came out of this showing that grades didn't have any

change, attendance was the same and there was not a significant difference in

behavior. (Dewitt)
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Overall school uniforms can hurt more than they fix. Better grades and higher

attendance are one of the main goals of getting school uniforms in the first place and

that goal doesn't get achieved. So what's the point exactly? We get to caught up in

social facts that dont have evidence and it can cause harm. Putting gender roles on

girls and hurting kids self image is just a couple of examples of what uniforms can do.

Individuality is taken away from these kids for the greater good which isn't even real.

For me school uniforms was something I absolutely hated growing up and I never saw

the reason for them.

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Work Cited
Happel, Alison. "Ritualized Girling: School Uniforms and the Compulsory

Performance of Gender." Journal of Gender Studies, vol. 22, no. 1, Mar. 2013, pp. 92-

96. EBSCOhost, doi:10.1080/09589236.2012.745680.

Park, Judy. "Do School Uniforms Lead to Uniform Minds?: School Uniforms and

Appearance Restrictions in Korean Middle Schools and High Schools." Fashion Theory:

The Journal of Dress, Body & Culture, vol. 17, no. 2, Apr. 2013, pp. 159-177.

EBSCOhost, doi:10.2752/175174113X13541091797607.

Dewitt, Charles. "Impact of schooluniforms." Proquest.com. ProQuest

Dissertations Publishing,, 2016. Web. 16 Apr. 2017.

Anderson, Dave. "Top 10 Reasons School Uniforms Should Be Banned." Top 10

Lists | ListLand.com. N.p., 05 Apr. 2017. Web. 18 Apr. 2017.

 Scandrett 10

Chris Higgins and Kathleen Knight Abowitz,What Makes a Public School Public?

A framework for Evaluating the Civic Suvstance of Schooling, Edcational Theory 61,

no. 4 (2011), 369