Schools to Consider Student Uniforms

Some Irvine Unified students may be required to wear school uniforms next school year.

District officials are drafting a policy that would allow individual schools to require uniforms next fall.

“The important question is: Why would a school want to consider that?” said Supt. Dennis M. Smith, who is creating a policy for the school board to review May 7. “Some communities do this because of the gang issue and all those problems that come up with gang-like dress. I don’t feel that’s a compelling issue at this time for Irvine.”

The issue was raised by parents who are pushing for uniforms at two Irvine elementary schools, Smith said. Their concerns are with the cost of school clothing and peer pressure to dress a certain way, he said.

If approved by the board, the policy would allow parents at individual schools to choose among a mandatory or voluntary uniform policy or no policy at all.

In researching uniform policies in other districts, Smith said, he found them to be “almost exclusively” limited to students in kindergarten through eighth grade.

However, district officials are crafting a dress code for the high school level, one that would prohibit gang-style clothing.

“We are going to substantially clamp down on wearing certain types of attire to high school,” school board member Tom Burnham said.

Irvine police estimate that 150 of the district’s 22,000 students are affiliated with gangs, Burnham said. “We know we have it under control,” he said. “Most of these kids moved into the district from other areas with gangs.”

The school board is also considering new policies that would make it easier for police to question students on campus and would establish a review board for attendance and child welfare.