KINGSTON – Following another attempt to enforce more stringent rules, more than 50 students from the Tivoli Gardens High School turned up at the Ministry of Education yesterday to express their concerns as they had not been admitted into the institution due to the length of their uniforms.
According to the rule book, the uniforms of these students should not be less than two inches below the knee.
When The Gleaner visited the Tivoli Gardens High School, representatives from the institution refused to comment on the matter.
Elaine Foster-Allen, permanent secretary in the education ministry, told The Gleaner she still had not received a report on the outcome of the meeting yesterday between the education officer responsible for the area and the school.
“I would hope that the matter is resolved quickly because while the children are out of school they are clearly losing teaching and learning time and this cannot continue,” Foster-Allen said.
“To be quite honest, the school’s rule book states that the length of the uniform should be two inches below the knee but, from what I saw today, all the children had uniforms that were longer than the required two inches.”
She added that if the rule has been changed then it needed to be clearly written in the rule book for the children.
“As I have always said, you don’t break rules, you negotiate and change them. I would expect that the children, the school leadership and the student council, if they wish, would have been involved in the making of that decision.
“However, at this time we really can’t spend time arguing about the length of a school uniform that appears to be modest and appropriate,” Foster-Allen continued. (Jamaica Gleaner)
