[MaryWitzl]

I had a Catholic school friend who was threatened with suspension because of wearing patent leather shoes (for just the reasons mentioned by others here), but I had no idea this was such a common presumption. A girl I knew who grew up in Alaska once got in trouble for wearing trousers to her high school; the dress code specified that girls had to wear skirts, whatever the weather. On the day she was sent home in her trousers, it was way below zero with a terrific wind chill factor.  She went back to school in her skirt -- and four pairs of tights.

The high school I went to had its share of clueless teachers, stupid rules, and daft administrators, but after hearing my friends' stories and reading all these comments, I think I got off easy.

[thunderingelephants Posts: 1,291 Status: Offline]

You would never have been allowed to wear trousers in any of the catholic schools either here or in England. That's still prevolent in England but not so much here.  Coats had to be either black or brown and the shoes the same.
Also, for the last two years of school, the uniform colour changed completely so for just two years, or in some cases, one year (like me), you had to waste money on another uniform.

[Liz Straw Posts: 1,033 Status: Offline That was a yummy book!]

When I was in High School there was a teacher that loved to hang out in the hall looking for dress code infractions.  Skirts had to be two inches or longer above the knee - if she or someone else thought they were shorter you had to kneel on the ground and they were measured.  We weren't allowed to were pants (trousers for those in the UK) no matter what the tempeture was or how much snow was on the ground and we wore knee socks most of the time.

This teacher also had a thing for patent leather shoes.  The thing is even in the late sixties, patent leather shoes were not really "true" patent leather shoes; they did not reflect enough to see up a dress.  Real patent leather shoes from earlier years and perhaps dance shoes might have once reflected enough to see up a dress.  I never saw shoes that that had such reflective quality.

[thunderingelephants Posts: 1,291 Status: Offline]

I'd be interested to know what you think of the rule I had to work under in a childcare centre: when children wanted to be involved in an activity, they each to had to ask the group join.  It was the same for toys which made things as a childcare worker hard.  If a child refused to share the toys, there was time limits for all toys.
It got to the stage that even childcare workers had to ask permission to speak to the children and that made things ridiculously strained.