Parents 'disgusted' as school bans socks because girls keep rolling skirts up

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

Parents have criticised school bosses for banning school socks because girls are rolling their skirts up. The move is being introduced at Co-op Academy Walkden from September, with girls told they will have to wear tights - of 'no less than 40 denier - with a skirt or trousers instead.

Families with children at the school have been told that it's because 'some pupils are wearing uniform inappropriately, including the way they wear their skirts'. Read more: 'We shouldn't have to fight to get the support we need for our kids' In a letter to parents, Ian Burchett, the Co-op Academies Trust education director for Greater Manchester, said the new uniform policy is being brought in after a series of student panel meetings, surveys and one-to-one conversations. "Many students are reporting two things," says the letter. "Firstly, that they feel a peer obligation to fit in with their friends and, as a result, dress similarly, and secondly that they feel that this pressure to wear their skirts as fashion items, often well above knee length, impacts their mental well-being." It adds: "It is our responsibility, as a family of Trust academies, to do what we can to take that pressure off our children." But parents have told us that staff have previously turned a blind eye to the issue of short skirts and should have given pupils a chance to address it, without bringing in an immediate sock ban.

One mum, who already has a child at the school and another one starting in September, said: "Surely they should challenge students on the length of their skirt first and look to improve things this way?

Schools have ignored this issue for such a long time, rather than go full throttle, they should take some small steps first. "If things