Lyme Regis: Woodroffe School issue warning over pupils' uniforms (From Bridport and Lyme Regis News)

Lyme Regis: Woodroffe School issue warning over pupils' uniforms

10:30am Wednesday 13th June 2012 in Lyme Regis By Rene Gerryts

The Woodroffe School

A WARNING has been sent out to Woodroffe School parents saying girls wearing too short skirts will face sanctions.

The letter signed by the heads of Years Seven, Eight, Nine and 10 said that in some cases skirts were so short it was impossible to retain any ‘sense of modesty’.

But pupils say the knee length rule is too much to expect teenagers to swallow.

Head Dr Richard Steward said: “We have really high uniform standards here and we monitor them regularly.

“Every now and again when things slip we need to warn students and remind parents what our expectations are.

“Uniform is worn here better than most schools in the country and we want to keep it that way.”

Teachers say there is a growing problem with regard to girls’ uniforms with a ‘significant’ number of girls coming to school with inappropriately short skirts.

The letter to parents says: “Students wearing these skirts are not only breaking the school uniform rules but, importantly, the shortness of skirts is inappropriate for the many day-to-day activities where students have to sit on floors as well as chairs.

“This, combined with the multi-levelled nature of the site makes it virtually impossible for girls wearing short skirts to retain any sense of modesty.

“In order to deal with this effectively we will need to impose sanctions on those students who continue to break the well-established school rules.

“Woodroffe is proud of its uniform – as indeed are most the students – but it must be worn correctly.”

Parents were given a deadline and anyone caught with non-regulation length skirts will face detention.

One GCSE student, who wanted to remain anonymous, said a lot of girls were unhappy with the school’s attitude.

She said: “They have been getting stricter and stricter on school uniform.

“Nobody has been sent home yet but quite a lot of people have been given after school detentions.

“Some people’s are indecent but the majority of people’s are not.

“They say they have to be at knee but most teenage girls are not going to wear their skirt that length – it is a bit of a big ask.

“Part of it is fashion, we all wear our uniform but sometimes you don’t want to wear exactly the same as everyone else.

“We don’t want to be clones.”

Parent Celina Roy, whose 11-year-old daughter Ellen chooses to wear trousers, said the rules ought to be abided by and some of the skirt lengths were outrageous.

She said she fell foul of rules when her son Callum, 13, went to school with spiky gelled hair and he was made to comply immediately.

She said even with the crack down a lot of girls were still flouting the rules.

She said: “A lot of them have skirts on but they might just as well not have one on.

“It is one of the school rules and it should be abided by.”

Pupil Imogen Barnard, youth parliament representative, said skirt length had always been a school rule.

She said: “I think some people wear them really long and some people wear them really short and they want people to look the same.”

Parent governor Catherine Davies added: “I think it is important that we all support the school policy and we all stand behind our headteacher in ensuring that the standard that he aims for is adhered to. It is about promoting a work ethic that is applicable to the whole school.”