Well as I told you all once before, I grew up on the island of Antigua for the first 17 years of my life. I have gone through pre-school to high school in Antigua, then 12th grade in New York and now i'm in University in Texas. In Antigua, we wear uniforms all the way through our school years. A very strict dress code and code of conduct are ingrained in us from an early age. Now i'm not going to talk about pre-school or elementary school but I will talk about high school and college and the differences that I realize.
DRESS CODE
At the Antigua Girls' High School, the ALL GIRLS high school that I attended for 5 years (we have no middle school so high school is equivalent to the 7th-11th grades) we wore a uniform that yes we all hated, it was a blue dress with a collar, a belt around the waist and black shoes with navy blue socks!! NO EXCEPTIONS. Our shoe heel couldn't be too high and we were only allowed one piercing in our ears only (could only be knobs or small rings with no colour or stones), no rings, no chains and no jewelry on our hands except a watch. We weren't allowed to wear weaves, or extensions of any sort unless for a medical reason.
When I moved to New York, I enrolled in Murry Bergtraum High School for Business Careers there was literally no dress code in the past years and then the year I got there they tried to implement a white shirt and black pant dress code which nobody followed except me of course because I was accustomed to wearing a uniform and I didn't see the problem with having a uniform but all the other students had a very serious problem with it because "they are trying to tell us what we must wear and that's taking away our freedom of expression". Hold up wait a minute, are you serious??? ITS SCHOOL what do you need to express through dress AT SCHOOL??? But anyway they ignored the dress code and there were no repercussions for them doing so.
PUNISHMENTS
If we were late 3 times to school without a valid excuse we received a detention, 3 detentions lead to a suspension and 3 suspensions lead to expulsion and since there isn't a "no child left behind" law no other school HAD to take you. Yes there were exceptions but for the most part we followed most of the rules. We were not allowed to be disrespectful to our teachers and there was certainly no tolerance for using curse words on the compound or while we were in uniform. We still got whoopings from teachers and the principal and during prayers when the entire school was assembled you could be punished infront of the entire school. Every Wednesday the detention list was read infront the entire school and if there was anybody who did anything that the principal thought the entire school should know about you would be embarrassed at general assembly. For fighting you could be suspended or expelled but in my five years of high school I only witnessed a handful of fights.
In NY students cursed at the teachers, at each other and to anybody they felt like they could because they had "freedom of speech". I'm sorry but this is something I have a very big problem with. I understand that yes sometimes teachers get on your nerves and drive you crazy but to disrespect an adult is just something I could never be OK with. The only thing that students really got punished for was fighting. There were other small things that made them get detention but punishments were very limited.
In University the language got worse and the disrespect more blatant. I guess because everyone thinks that they are grown and that they know everything they need to, there's really no reason to listen or treat others with respect. Some teachers ask you to leave class or they may rant on or deduct points from your final grade but some students seem not to care at all. The only things that that get severely punished are fights, weed and weapons. You get fined for having alcohol on campus or for being too loud and having illegal roommates in your dorm but that is it.
I have enjoyed going through these different education systems however there needs to be a lot of changes to them.
LEMME HEAR WHAT YOU GOTTA SAY!!! LEAVE A COMMENT!!! :)
