I HATE THE P.E. UNIFORMS
(AND SCHOOL UNIFORMS)
STUFF YOU MAY NOT HAVE LEARNED IN MIDDLE SCHOOL: THERE ARE ONLY FOUR WORDS IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE THAT END IN-DOUS: TREMENDOUS, HORRENDOUS, STUPENDOUS, AND HAZARDOUS.
Really, it’s not only the clothes some of you have to wear for gym class, right? Lots of schools all across the country and around the world are finding that school uniforms are really helpful for decreasing violence and decreasing problems with students wearing clothes that are a distraction or otherwise inappropriate.
So you might be bugged by the shorts and T-shirt you have to wear for gym class. Or even more, you might be bugged by the uniform you have to wear to school.
Here’s the upside to remember: Everyone else is wearing it also.
No, seriously. It might be awkward to wear those gym clothes or school uniforms if you were the only one who had to wear them. But when everyone has to wear them, it’s not really that big a deal, right? At least it’s not as big a deal as it would be if only you had to wear them. Man, that would really stink!
While you might think it’s a total pain in the behind to wear clothes you would never choose for yourself, there are some great advantages to everyone wearing the same thing:
First, it means you don’t have to worry about what you wear. I (Marko) remember a student who was a super-popular middle school guy. I once asked him what caused him stress. He thought about it for a minute, and then he answered (to my surprise), “What to wear to school. Every morning and every night I stand in front of my closet and wonder if what I wear to school will cause people to like me less.” Now, that’s pretty sad; and we hope you aren’t that extreme. But when everyone gets to wear whatever they want, there is a lot of pressure to look a certain way or to have the right brands or to have new stuff (or old stuff, or whatever’s in style). School gym clothes (and school uniforms) do away with that kind of pressure.
Second, gym clothes and school uniforms are the great equalizer. That just means everyone is equal when it comes to clothes. And that can make it easier for you to make new friends. Think about it, in schools where they don’t wear the same gym clothes (or have school uniforms), kids in certain groups of friends all dress the same way. That’s just one more (likely expensive) hurdle you’d have to get past if you tried to make a new friend.
One more thought—without P.E. uniforms, you’d probably get all sweaty and smelly from running laps in your school clothes, right? Who wants that?