Because every school sets its own uniform policy, parents can still face very different expectations and costs.<\/p>\n
Lorraine, who lives in London, has two children in secondary schools and is frustrated that her school has not changed any of its uniform policy this year.<\/p>\n
She says several items are still compulsory, including the branded blazer, tie, branded polo shirt, branded shorts and two-toned PE socks.<\/p>\n
Even the plain grey trousers or skirt have to be purchased from one of the school’s suppliers, she says.<\/p>\n
Both her sons have been through a growth spurt this summer, so she is expecting to spend more than \u00a3200 on their branded items alone.<\/p>\n
“I’m just frustrated, for me it’s not even about the money,” she says.<\/p>\n
“I feel these inconsistencies do not make a difference to education and are really blinkered.”<\/p>\n
But mum-of-five Carol, from Stockport, welcomes the changes at her children’s school. She says her son’s secondary school only requires a branded blazer, a branded jumper and tie, with everything else available from a range of shops.<\/p>\n
She tries to get most of her children’s uniforms second-hand anyway, but always buys the blazer, which costs around \u00a330, as she likes them to have a new one.<\/p>\n
She says anything that makes it more affordable for parents is a good thing.<\/p>\n
But others are not seeing the changes they would like.<\/p>\n
One father from Oxfordshire, who did not want to be named, says his daughter still has to have seven branded items – three for the uniform, three for PE and a summer polo shirt – as there are no alternatives allowed. <\/p>\n
“It’s ridiculous and unfair. We are paying \u00a3200 which we can’t afford,” he says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Because every school sets its own uniform policy, parents can still face very different expectations and costs. Lorraine,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":733216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[84,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-733215","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=733215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/733215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/733216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=733215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=733215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=733215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}