Pupils at a secondary school in Bristol were reportedly sent home after turning up to class in their PE kits after a health alert was issued for the whole of England amid an ongoing heatwave. Parents at Bristol Free School in Southmead said class sizes were halved on Thursday after dozens of children were turned away from the school gate for wearing their PE kits instead of the full school uniform. Staff backpedalled on the need for a school tie in an email sent the following day, but doubled down on the importance of following the strict uniform rules – including a plain blue shirt and charcoal-coloured trousers or skirt.
One frustrated parent who had sent their child to school in their PE kit of a polo shirt and shorts said the “inflexibility was ridiculous”. “There have been lots of complaints this week, and for many months and years, about how rigid the school uniform is,” they told Bristol Live.
“Lots of parents have asked the school leadership and gone to the governors, and the students themselves have got petitions up,” they added.
“[But] there was a review of uniform policy last year, which decided it shouldn’t change. It’s inherently sexist too, because girls can wear skirts or trousers and boys have to wear trousers, they are not allowed to wear shorts.
“So, when we get extremely hot weather … boys in particular get very hot. There’s a feeling that the school doesn’t have the wellbeing of the students as a priority, that they are more concerned with the image of the school, and this is a genuine concern because of the heat.”
“My daughter came home on Thursday and she was so upset, she was a mess,” another parent said. “She’s been taking in spare shirts but she kept her jumper on all day yesterday. These are teenagers, they get sweaty and they also get embarrassed.
“Pale blue is the worst colour to wear if you’re sweaty in hot weather. So, [on Friday] I thought, ‘I’ve had enough’. There was an amber warning for the heat so I said she could wear her PE kit. I saw her off to school, only to see her come back home because she’d been turned away at the gate.
“Then I got a message from the school saying they were marking it as an unauthorised absence because I hadn’t contacted them to say why she was off. They had the gall to tell me I hadn’t reported her absence when I dropped her off at the school gates ready to learn, and they had turned her away.”
Bristol Free School’s stated approach to uniform regulation is that rules may be relaxed “from time to time, for example in particularly hot weather”.
Chair of governors Anne-Marie Boyle reportedly told parents at a meeting in response to lobbying by parents last July that a hot weather uniform adjustment using the PE kit was in place, at the headteacher’s discretion.
The email sent on Friday confirmed that there were no plans to adjust the uniform rules during the current heatwave; however, despite temperatures in Bristol reaching 30C on Thursday, the UK Health and Security Agency (UKHSA) issued an amber alert for heat health in southwest England.
“We are monitoring the weather regularly and will inform you of any reasonable adjustments to uniform if required,” it continued.
“We encourage all students not to wear jumpers or coats (some are still wearing them). All students should bring a refillable water bottle and should apply sunscreen. Students are also welcome to wear wide-brimmed hats at lunchtime and to make use of the shade.”
Bristol Free School has been contacted for comment.