A Week of Winning Strategies for the Back to School Dress Code Battle
by Casey Curry

It’s back to school time and if you are lucky enough to have your teens enrolled in schools with uniform, I salute and envy you.  As a creative writing teacher in an inner city magnet high school, I’ve seen it all.  School’s been in session two weeks and already I’ve seen the good, the bad and much more of the “ugly” than you’d imagine.  As a busy mom with two in college and a high school age daughter I’ve got a little firsthand experience with the dress code wars.  The line between expressing your individuality and your inner self and looking utterly ridiculous can be a very thin one. 

“…You’re wearing that to school?”
So, the idea is that we must start early and teach our kids family and community standards of dress and behavior.  But often even when those lessons are taught and learned, adolescence brings on a purging of all past knowledge and your former polite, well dressed child becomes completely “brand new”.  So if you don’t want to start each morning with a question mark, battle, stress and a subsequent headache – here are five tried and true tips that will work, one for each day of the school week!

Monday
1.     Shop together!  I made the mistake one year of letting one of my  daughters go shopping with her best friend for just a few of her school clothes.  The crazy matching summer clothes they purchased from the clearance rack became her favorites and the battle lines were drawn.  Avoid this by shopping together.  A mini difference in opinion in a pleasant mall with piped in music is always better than any full scale battle in the morning before school.

Tuesday
2.    Organize closets.  This falls in the ounce of prevention category.  But when things are organized and sorted it is easier to weed out things that become more popular as they are outgrown.  Take a Saturday afternoon and do this together with the teen’s choice of music.  It can be great quality talk time. This is a great time to purge and give away.  This needs to be done often.  It is more blessed to give than to receive and you can teach this with regular round ups of too tight jeans and other items that can be donated to local shelters and church clothing drives.

Wednesday
3.    Be Parental & don’t make it personal.   You are the parent.  You buy the clothes.  I try to refrain from “because I said so” as an answer for any question.  However, telling your child firmly in a soft voice that you find a particular clothing combination “unacceptable” works.  It speaks of your standard. Practice the word and use it. This can never be about your child’s fashion sense, taste or lack thereof.  It can also never be about your child’s body or body time.  Too tall for that, too short for that, too big for that are, well –unacceptable.  So it’s about the garment or ensemble, it’s not about the kid.

Thursday
4.    Teach Fashion History!  Let your darling sons know that sagging pants comes out of the prison culture when belts are confiscated and that prisoners can hold up their pants with one hand because they don’t have to carry books and get to class between bells.  Share with your daughters that certain garments come straight out of burlesque shows and then guide them by asking them what image they want to reflect and if the clothing support that.  Many of them just haven’t stopped to think.
Friday

5.    Bring It Back to THE STANDARD.  This is different for each family, for us is it a biblical standard, family standard and school standard.  So, this translates to “modest apparel” and looking like who you say you are.  But it also has to speak to obedience of school rules. Help them to understand that even though their peers might think their gear is “on point”, that their teachers and future employers will not.  The standard has to be consistent and visual impressions are lasting.  Guide them to own and control their image. So finally, remind your  teen of your shared standard and be patient, it is a process and they won’t always need this outward expression of their uniqueness.
Enjoy your weekend!

Copyright © 2008 Casey Curry

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