Uniforms

Uniforms

In Mark Mathabane’s article “Appearances Are Destructive,” he makes the argument that schools need required uniforms, in order to better the education of today’s youth. Mark’s main points are that children around America are being ridiculed by their peers for what they wear, or rather what they do not wear. Even though America has many advantages with technology that kids from other countries only dream about having, kids are only worried about how they look. He explains how the youth perceive possessions and appearances more important than intelligence and academics. “But despite these benefits, which students in many parts of the world only dream about, my sisters’ efforts at learning were almost derailed. They were constantly taunted for their homely outfits. A couple of times they came home in tears.” (Mathabane 209) Mark argues about schools with uniforms outperform the ones that do have uniforms academically, the uniforms are observed as part of creating the proper learning environment (Mathabane 210). Altogether, his article is not persuasive in getting the reader to agree with Mark about kids needing school uniforms. He does not provide many facts to back up his statements on how uniforms help students learn. Schools without uniforms can easily score better than those with uniforms, the only true way to test it are to make sure that the two schools are teaching the exact same things. Not having the latest trend in clothes to wear may contribute to being made fun of, but uniforms will not help students perform better in schools as Mathabane thinks, kids will find a way to make fun of you even with uniforms.

Throughout Mark Mathabane’s article he mentions how his sisters got ridiculed in school every day for not having the trendy clothes, causing them to not be able to focus regularly on their education (Mathabane 209). This may be true for his sisters, but you cannot generalize the rest of the youth in America based on his sister’s school...