The benefits and drawbacks of wearing school uniform

In most East Asian countries, wearing uniform is a rule. This is not the case in America, however. As a student who experienced both American education and Korean education, I have spent several years wearing uniforms at school and the rest of my secondary school not wearing uniforms. When I wore uniform, I hated this rule and could list numerous reasons for not wearing it. But, as I attend American school, I perceived several benefits, and often missed wearing uniforms. Although there are reasons to not wear uniform, there are also reasons to support wearing uniform at school.
Wearing uniform can be financial burden. In Korea, uniform cost as high as several hundred dollars. To the riches, spending thousand dollars are not much burden, but this money can be burdensome to average household. On average, a family lives with two thousand dollars per month in Korea. So five hundred dollars of school uniform can be extremely burdensome for parents, and if a family has multiple children, they will need to spend much of the money on purchasing uniform. Also teens grow up quickly, so they often need to buy new uniform every semester. Then the financial pressure on parents is much more.

However, there are some advantages to wearing uniform. First, wearing uniform makes schools look more orderly. During a gathering, students wearing the same uniform will look more orderly than students wearing whatever clothes they want. And just by wearing same uniform, students might feel more united with classmates and might boost cooperation.

Also wearing uniform simplifies the school’s dress code. Generally speaking, schools without uniforms tend to have much complex dress codes. Students can wear anything they want as long as they do not offend others. To help students to understand what can be offensive, school set limitations on the dress code that takes up several pages. If schools have a set uniform, then they do not need to spell out the dress code. As a result, schools can save trees and also use the budget on other useful things such as buying better desks. Also wearing uniform can prevent fight between students caused by clothes that offended particular ethnic groups.

Therefore, even though wearing uniform can be financial burden, it can also be a good thing.