The time when a school uniform was regarded as an unacceptable constraint on the individuality of school students is gone. Despite recent controversies, most parents – and their offspring – see its advantages 

At Camden School for Girls in London, where I was a pupil, the roof fell in one night in 1973. It made the front page of the London evening paper as it would have killed us all if it had happened a few hours later. I still suspect it was caused by the clogs. The school had recently abandoned its green uniform, and at the time we all wore stripy socks and wooden clogs. As the bell went for break, the thunder of our clogs began and I am convinced they shook the very foundations of the school.

In those days, it was quite normal for state schools not to have uniforms. Well, not official ones anyway. We made up our own, whether it was clogs at a progressive London school, or scruffy jeans and jumpers in Dublin at my husband’s Christian Brothers school.

These days, the pendulum has swung back and the vast majority of schools, state and private, have returned to the classic school uniform of ties, shirts, jumpers, skirts or trousers and blazers. Is this mere nostalgia, reflecting the new curriculum with its emphasis on Greek myths and subordinating conjunctions? Or is there a more serious purpose behind it?