The rise of violence in today's schools is being considered the worst threat facing the youth of our nation by many school and health professionals (King 1). School officials search for answers to help improve the environment of their schools, only to see conditions continue to deteriorate. Officials have looked into using more security, turn the school year into an all year program, switching schools into magnet schools, implementing school uniform programs, and some schools have even went to the extreme of adding metal detectors in the main entrances of the school.

In 1994 Long Beach Unified School District, in California, became the first major school district in the nation to implement a mandatory school uniform policy. According to an article by Jessica Portner, the policy required 83,000 elementary and middle school students to begin wearing a school uniform. Since then, school officials report a 76% drop in crime from the year before the implementation to the 1996-97 school year. The question is are mandatory school uniform policies the first step in improving the quality of education children in every school across the nation receive today?

positive results in Long Beach, President Clinton has since showed his approval of nation wide school uniform policies in his 1996 State of the Union Address. This has prompted school officials in larger school districts from New York to Chicago, and states ranging from Maryland, Florida, Louisiana, Georgia, and Virginia, all famous for troubled schools, to begin looking at and implementing school uniform policies. All of the above schools have shown a lower amount of violent crime and test scores have been on the rise after the implementation of the uniform policies (Caruso 84).

Costs of uniforms tend to be the biggest drawback to parents who can barely keep a roof over their family member's heads. However, if parents were to do a little research, they would find that the parents from districts, who have implemented school uniform policies, have insisted that a set of three uniforms cost between $70 and $90, being no more expensive than one designer outfit. In addition, when a community adopts a school uniform policy, the local merchants can supply the uniform pieces at competitive prices just like other items of clothing ("School").

With all the positive results shown in the troubled school districts having implemented school uniform policies, why don't more school districts across the nation not adopted these policies as well? Many groups and organizations like The American Civil Liberties Union, the nations biggest opponent to school uniform policies, argue that the policies are an infringement on the free expression rights of the students.

Parents nationwide also confirm their disapproval due to the expense of the uniforms, which may be especially difficult for the poorer families of children. Opponents fear that students from these families may find it easier to not attend school rather than buy a school uniform wardrobe (Caruso 87).

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Approximate Word count = 2857
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)