argument essay uniforms

35 Pros and Cons of School Uniforms

School uniforms in public schools are considered essential for teaching children to obey rules and develop a sense of community in many countries, including the UK and Australia. But public schools in other countries like the USA and Canada rarely enforce mandatory school uniforms.

It is, however, far more common for private schools to enforce school uniforms no matter the country in question.

This article takes a deep dive into the pros and cons of school uniforms, showing that there are positive arguments on both sides of this debate.

Overview – 10 Top Pros and Cons of School Uniforms

Pros of school uniforms, 1. affordability.

Many schools intentionally choose uniforms that are very basic, such as “white polo shirt and grey shorts”, so that parents do not have to pay exorbitant amounts of money on the uniforms. Many low-cost clothing stores also make the effort to produce and distribute these typical uniform-conformant clothes at low cost during back-to-school sales.

A typical 5 pack of basic white polo shirts that students can wear to school as a uniform is likely to be significantly cheaper than an outfit a child would wear otherwise.

Furthermore, while children in schools without uniforms would feel pressure to change up their outfits regularly (adding to costs), the forced repetition of wearing

Related Article: 17 Surprising School Uniform Statistics, Facts & Data

2. Hand-me-Down Options

It is regular practice at schools with school uniforms for parents to offer uniforms for free as hand-me-down outfits once their children grow out of the uniform. This has the effect of helping poorer families to access uniforms for their children without cost.

There tends to be an over-supply of uniforms – both new and second-hand – because of the sheer number of children growing out of their uniform every month. As a result, parents in desperate need of uniforms are often able to source uniforms for free.

Many schools have a hand-me-down bin in their front office, allowing parents to drop-off pre-loved uniforms, and other parents to arrive and request free shirts and pants discretely.

3. Visible Poverty is Reduced

If all children are dressed the same, the poorer children whose parents cannot afford brand-name clothing are not as visibly singled-out. They will be wearing the same clothes as the wealthier children.

This can have the effect of reducing chances of bullying based on a child’s family’s levels of wealth. But it also enables children who are poor to feel as if they are no different from others. It helps to start all children off on a level playing field, and makes them feel more secure that they’re just another student – neither better or worse than other students who are of higher or lower wealth.

4. Students may Focus and Listen Better

In this study by Chris Baumann and Hana Krskova, published in the International Journal of Educational Management , it was found that children wearing school uniforms tend to listen more intently and for longer periods of time than children without uniforms.

As a result, they found that teachers also spent less time disciplining students and waiting for students to give their attention to the teachers. This leads to more engaged working time in the classroom.

One potential reason behind this finding is that the conformity in dress reduces distractions for students.

However, there are plenty of other studies that have found no significant difference in academic achievement by parents, so in my opinion the jury is still out on whether this is true. More research is required.

5. Ensures Appropriate Sporting Outfits

Even schools that do not have mandatory school uniforms often have sports uniforms for physical education lessons. This is for several reasons, including both conformity and practicality.

Firstly, there are unique pros and cons of sports uniforms that differ from those of school uniforms. Namely, teams in sports need to have a sense of camaraderie and unity that the uniform can help achieve. Wearing the same colors can instil team spirit that helps with the team’s performance.

Secondly, a team uniform is useful in sports for helping to quickly identify team members to pass the ball to or seek support in the fast pace of a game.

Thirdly, a sports uniform is specifically designed and loosely fitted so students are comfortable while engaging in physical activity, which may include physical contortions, stretching, sprinting, and other actions not usually undertaken outside of the sporting arena.

6. Increases Physical Activity During Physical Education

A study by Nathan et al. in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity found that children who wear dedicated sporting uniforms during sports lessons tend to do more physical activity than children who do not.

This was a sizeable study – with 42 schools and over 3000 children studied – making these findings some of the more reliable results within the school uniforms literature.

Logically, this also checks out.

Firstly, if all children are wearing a pre-approved sporting outfit that is fit for purpose and can be comfortable during physical activity, they will have less clothing distractions and have one less potential barrier preventing them from participation in lessons.

Secondly, another logical rationale for this is that the students know they can change out of the uniform after the lesson (into either their regular uniform or non-uniform clothing), giving them the sense that they can sweat and get the uniforms dirty without suffering negative consequences for the remainder of the day.

Thirdly, it could be argued that the act of putting on the sporting uniform can help students psychologically prepare for the physical activity. The uniform is a psychological signal to the students that it’s time for them to do exercise.

7. Less Bullying

School uniforms could remove one more thing that children can be bullied over. If all children are dressed the same, then children will not bully one another for their fashion choices.

And high school students seem to agree that bullying will be decreased if mandatory uniform policies are introduced.

However, empirical evidence does not always support this widely-held belief. This study , for example, found no difference in disciplinary issues before and after a school uniform was introduced at one particular school.

It is possible that bullying will happen regardless of uniforms, and that making all children wear uniforms does nothing to actually teach kindness. A bully will be a bully – targeting things other than dress codes if need be – unless the bully is actively taught not to do so.

8. Confidence and Self-Esteem

A study by Sanchez et al. interviewed 604 middle school students found that the students reported increased confidence and self-esteem while wearing uniforms. The primary hypothesis for this growth in confidence is that students didn’t feel so self-aware about the way they dressed.

However, it’s possible that some students may also develop increased confidence by expressing themselves through their uniforms. By trying out new clothes, children learn to develop a unique identity and get more practice dressing in ways that make them feel good about themselves.

9. Improves the School’s Image in the Community

A school with a cleaner uniform where students appear well-dressed may have a better image in the community than a school without a uniform, or even with an outdated or simple uniform.

And a study by the National Association of Elementary Schools Principals (NAESP) shows that this is a key concern for school principals. 83% of principals in the study reported that they believed the uniforms improved their school’s image in the community.

Here, the main concern of the school principals is the message the uniform sends and not and actual tangible effect. Given there are several studies highlighting that there is no academic benefit of a uniform, this seems like a vanity metric.

Nevertheless, the symbolism of having well-dressed students can have the effects of attracting new parents to the school and having parents and the community value and respect the school and its students more.

10. School Spirit

School spirit includes pride and sense of belonging within a school. Wearing a uniform may help with this. If all the students are wearing the same clothing, there’s a sense that they’re “a team” and “working together” rather than being individualistic.

The NAESP study named above also looked at principals’ perceptions of whether uniforms improve school spirit. 77% of school principals in schools with uniforms believed that uniforms did help with school spirit.

11. Saving Time in Mornings

Many parents also like schools that have uniforms. It’s simply easier to get ready in the morning if children know exactly what to wear. There is no back-and-forth choosing and changing outfits or arguments between parents and children about what is acceptable to wear.

And in fact, the NAESP study found that 92% of parents believe it’s easier to get their kids ready in the morning if they have a school uniform. Similarly, 93% of parents believe that a uniform policy saves time in mornings.

Significantly, the parents cited less wardrobe battles as the key reason time is saved.

12. Safety and Identifiability on School Grounds

If all students are wearing school uniforms, it’s easier to identify people on the school grounds who do not belong there. Those people would not be wearing uniforms.

This is why (as this study shows) parents and teachers tend to perceive uniforms as positively impacting school safety, while students don’t believe uniforms make them more safe.

Of course, there is one big hole in this argument.

It would only make it easier to identify children or teenagers who do not belong. Parents who do not belong could easily be confused for a teacher seeing as most schools don’t have uniform policies for teachers.

And of course, one big threat to school safety is adults coming onto the grounds impersonating teachers.

Which begs the question: why do children have to wear uniforms and teachers don’t? If the argument is children on school grounds need to be identifiable by their uniforms, then shouldn’t teachers also have to wear uniforms so they’re identifiable? It seems like adult hypocrisy to me.

13. Age and Gender Identification

Uniforms may also be useful to schools for age identification of children. This would require different year levels to have different uniforms. For example, the infants could wear one color while the older children can wear another.

This would allow schools to police movement through the school. If a younger child is in a part of the school reserved for the older children, they could be easily identified and sent to their dedicated space (which may also help with safety).

This identification could also work across gender lines, where different genders can wear different uniforms. For example, if there are two private schools side-by-side where one is all-girls and one is all-boys, then this could work well to ensure the two genders remain separated, as per the private schools’ policies and ethos.

14. Reduction of Prejudice

It could be argued that, if all students dress the same, then there is less chance of prejudice by students and teachers.

For example, if a child wears a particular religious dress that a teacher dislikes, the teacher may treat them differently. But if all children dress the same, then the teacher is less likely to be prejudiced toward that child.

However, there is an obvious flaw in this argument. It doesn’t reduce prejudice because it is potentially prejudicial to tell some children they’re not allowed to dress in ways that accord with their culture or religion.

15. Identification during Excursions

School excursions to busy places can be stressful for teachers. The teacher needs to keep an eye on all the students in the class while there are also many other members of the public in the same space.

Uniforms are very useful in these situations. The teacher can count-off all the people in uniform to easily ensure all the students are there and ready for their next instructions.

16. Learning to ‘Dress Appropriately’

All cultures have rules around acceptable forms of dress. Usually, these have to do with not wearing sexually provocative clothing and not wearing clothing with insulting or provocative signs on them.

A uniform gives students a set of guidelines about what is considered acceptable and unacceptable to wear.

And it seems parents and school administrators often cite this as a key reason for mandatory school uniforms, particularly in religious schools .

However, this also raises concerns about exclusionary dress. Different people have different ideas around what is and is not appropriate. If you’re attending a school that has more conservative values than your family, you may feel particularly constrained by an arbitrary dress code that doesn’t conform with your own values.

17. Protects and Extends Childhood

Most people believe that sexuality and sexualization should not be associated with childhood. By enforcing a school uniform, children are discouraged from wearing sexually evocative clothing that most of society would consider inappropriate at a young age.

Thus, by enforcing a uniform, children feel less pressure to focus on their outfits, ‘looking good’ for the opposite (or same!) sex, or thinking about sexually provocative clothing.

18. Truancy can be Identified

I grew up in a school where we all wore uniforms. Police would often approach students walking around town in uniform during the school day. They would ask if we were supposed to be at school (and sometimes even call the school).

If students were found to be truanting, the police would drive them back to school.

Thus, uniforms can also be a useful way for the whole community to oversee where children of school age should be at all times.

Of course, children can simply get around this by bringing a change of clothes, which would in-turn make it easier for them to truant if the police are looking for people in school uniform!

19. They Teach Gender Norms

Many conservative parents want their children to grow up conforming to society’s gender norms. Boys are raised to be leaders and girls are raised to be ladies.

And while in today’s age, gender norms are increasingly considered to be bad for society and children, some parents still desire this for their children.

So, for those parents, uniforms could be a positive. Girls are taught to wear skirts and dresses, while boys are taught to wear shorts. Even these uniform requirements send a message – it’s harder to do rough and tumble activities in a skirt than shorts!

By raising children from a young age to wear gender-conforming outfits, the schools are showing the children how to ‘act their gender’.

I personally consider this to be a negative, but many parents see it as a positive, so I’ve placed it here for them!

20. Protection of a School’s Religious, Cultural, or Social-Class Identity

Public schools usually do not have religious, cultural or social-class identities that diverge from the mainstream.

However, many private schools have particular affiliations, such as:

• Affiliation with a religion.
• A desire to appear upper-class.
• Affiliation with a particular cultural group (such as international schools).

For these schools, uniforms can act as signals about the school’s values. An upper-class school might enforce the wearing of blazers with school crests on them.

And some religious schools may have rules about wearing traditional or conservative clothing.

This can help create a unified sense of the school’s identity.

21. Prevention of Gang-Related Color Schemes

In areas where gangs are active, school uniforms can help ensure gang-related colors are not worn on school grounds. This can help make schools gang-free zones and help prevent student recruitment into gangs.

Without the visible signs of gangs at school, the gangs’ influence and perceived power is reduced. It can also help minimize chances of rival gang groups from targeting one another on school grounds based on the clothing the students are wearing.

Furthermore, students who have no affiliation to gangs could be made to feel safer if the visibility of gangs is reduced. The intimidating insignia of gangs would not be visible to them at school each day. Read more about the relationship between gangs and school uniforms here .

22. Uniforms make Plain Clothes Dress Days Fun!

Let’s finish up with a fun one. In Australia we used to have a thing called “mufti day”. We would have this day about twice a year. And it was a day where you could wear whatever you want!

In the lead-up to mufti day, we would all be on our best behavior so it would go ahead. The day was, after all, a reward for good behavior.

On mufti day, everyone would be very excited. We would plan out and wear our favorite outfits.

This gave the teachers extra leverage to get the students to behave. And it gave the students something fun to look forward to!

Cons of School Uniforms

23. there is no impact on grades.

Several studies have found no changes in academic achievement between groups of students who wear uniforms and those who do not. If there is no clear academic benefit of a uniform, it can be argued that the uniforms are pointless.

It seems that the true benefit of wearing a uniform is in the hidden curriculum – that is, in teaching things at school that are not in the academic curriculum. That includes things like discipline and conformity. Whether it’s the role of schools to teach these things, however, is open for debate. Should schools just focus on grades and not on reinforcing conformity and discipline?

24. Lack of Freedom of Expression

There are some who question the legality and constitutionality of enforcing school uniforms in public schools in the United States. The First Amendment protects freedom of speech , which may also protect free dress.

However, to date, the Supreme Court has not made any comment on the constitutionality of uniforms. In 1969 , it got close, but upholding students’ rights to wear black armbands to protest the Vietnam war.

Overall, the key argument here is that a dress code restricts creative expression. If we want our education system to build-up creative, critical, and free-thinking people, a uniform seems inappropriate.

The uniform literally makes people uniform , in the sense that ‘uniform’ means ‘the same’.

Do we really want schools to be making us all the same? Isn’t that exactly the problem with the education system today?

25. Visible Diversity can be a Good Thing

People who argue for school uniforms say that it prevents bullying. It stops children from teasing each other because of what they wear.

But if we want a multi-cultural world, isn’t school the perfect place to start talking about our diversity and how it’s a good thing?

But making all children wear uniforms, we’re hiding (“sweeping under the rug”) diversity. We’re preventing conversations about it and celebration of it.

Thus, uniforms are arguably outdated in a world where diversity should be something that is visible, celebrated, and discussed – especially in schools.

26. Lack of Choice of Dress Codes

Another key problem with school uniforms is that children often don’t get a chance to have a say about what the dress code should be. Many uniform dress codes are decades old , and the children currently wearing the uniforms just wear what they’re told to wear.

But, you would think that a fair and democratic school would let the children wearing the uniform to choose what it looks like.

Unfortunately, it is usually the teachers, administrators, and parents who make these decisions. Even worse, sometimes it’s an outside company that is hired to select the uniform. Children are rarely consulted.

What does that say about what sort of people we’re raising in our schools? Do we want to raise compliant sheep, or creative people who are active participants in community decision-making, especially when it comes to decisions that directly affect them?

Related: 31 School Dress Code Examples

27. Uniforms can be Ugly

This may seem like a very superficial point, but it’s also serious. We’re forcing children to wear clothing that the children themselves might consider to be ugly. It seems a little unfair to tell people to wear something that they consider to be unattractive.

You look around at some schools and they have color schemes that include browns, mustards, and greys, that most people wouldn’t choose to wear if they had the choice!

Of course, this isn’t the most serious of points. But, for the children, it may be a very serious one indeed. They have to deal with it every day!

28. Violation of Religious Expression

This is one of the most serious problems with school uniforms. There are religions that have very strict dress code rules. These include having to wear certain colors, hair coverings, and even ceremonial knives (for some Sikhs).

By enforcing a strict uniform policy, you may be violating religious liberty.

When I was in school, we had one girl at the school who was a Muslim and who wore a Hijab. Her parents had to negotiate with the school principal about what uniform she could wear, seeing as the school didn’t have approved hijabs in the uniform code.

At the end of the day, her mother made her a hijab that was in the school colors, and everyone was happy. But, it still required some negotiation because of differences between religious requirements and school uniform policy.

29. Uniforms Require Parental Cooperation

Uniforms can cause conflicts between the school and the parents. I remember one girl I went to school with who would sometimes come to school out of uniform. She would get into trouble and not be allowed to play at lunch.

The problem was that it wasn’t her fault. Her parents often wouldn’t wash her uniform for her, meaning she didn’t have a choice but to wear a non-uniform outfit.

Here, my classmate was getting into trouble even though it wasn’t her fault – it was her parents!

We can see that parents need to cooperate and consent to the uniform policy. They have to make sure their child wears the uniform, and if enough parents don’t participate, the mandatory uniform policy falls apart.

30. Gender Expression Issues

In today’s day and age, we’re learning that enforcing gender norms in schools could be a violation of the gender expression of children. Some girls don’t want to wear dresses . And sometimes this isn’t even an issue of gender selection. It’s simply the fact that some girls don’t want to wear dresses!

Here, a uniform could be considered a violation of a child’s gender expression. Conservative old people are telling kids what to wear, even though perhaps their values are outdated for today’s world!

In fact, this became a big issue in a state in Australia where it was found many private schools forced girls to wear dresses . The state government had to intervene, with a government commissioner saying the schools were “stuck in a different age”.

31. Erases Cultural Differences

While school uniforms are seen as a positive for helping to erase visible social-class differences in schools (rich vs poor), they also have the negative effect over erasing cultural differences.

Children of all different races, cultures, and ethnicities attend modern schools. But, at least in Western schools, they must all adhere to a western dress code that doesn’t allow for cultural expression.

Forcing children to wear the clothes of a culture that is not their own is most visible (and, perhaps, offensive) when it comes to religious objections. However, even without the religious element, forcing children to wear uniforms can be seen as a form of cultural assimilation. It denies people their chance to practice their culture in the public sphere.

32. Difficulty in Finding the Uniform

When a school decides to enforce a uniform policy, it needs to take into account how easy it would be for parents to find the uniform.

Many public schools with uniform policies intentionally make this easy. They will be okay with a plain white or blue polo shirt.

But more prestigious schools will often develop uniforms that are very specific – with complex logos or designs on them. These uniforms often need to be bought straight from the school uniform shop or a small number of pre-approved nearby stores.

At the start of the school year, it can be find to get your hands on a uniform. All the parents are trying to get them at the same time!

This can also lead to price gouging where shops raise the price because they know demand is higher than supply.

33. They Promote Social-Class Identities

If you look at different schools’ uniform policies, you quickly see that some schools have very posh policies while other public schools that serve working-class communities have simple bland polo shirts.

In fact, some elite private schools require ‘white collared’ dress shirts, while public schools will require ‘blue collared’ shirts you’d more commonly see being worn by a construction worker.

These differences in dress codes from so early on reveal something unfair about the school system: wealthy people have the choice to go to elite schools where they’re raised for high-powered, high-paid white collar jobs (lawyers, etc.). Many public schools, as seen by the sorts of uniforms provided, are more humble and appear to be raising people in comfortable clothes that you’d expect to be worn for manual labor jobs.

In other words, uniforms don’t just train people to embrace gender norms. It also trains people to embrace social-class based identities.

34. It’s Another Thing for Teachers to Police

Mandatory school uniforms are just one more thing for teachers to have to worry about. In a world where teachers are over-worked and under-paid, it might be better for teachers to simply not have to worry about what their students wear.

Furthermore, for teachers who are on a power trip, it gives the teachers an excuse to get children into trouble. A small and minor problem, such as having an untucked t-shirt , could lead a child to get into trouble.

Here, rather than the school focusing on education, it may focus on nit-picking and bullying of students (as a teacher, I have a real issue with how often I see teachers bullying students based on things irrelevant to their education).

35. Upfront Costs

While it is arguable that school uniforms can be a more affordable choice than non-uniform outfits for children, some still argue that mandating school uniforms adds a cost burden for parents. Parents need to buy everyday clothing for their children regardless of whether they’re at school. Children need something to wear on weekends and during school holidays, after all!

So, at the start of the school year, often parents do need to fork out money they hadn’t planned to, and all at once.

For example, this report from the London School of Economics, points to one case study where a parent in England had to pay £310 for her children’s uniforms at the start of the school year. The woman was under particular financial strain as she was living on subsistence from the government, which was £556 a month. In this instance, uniforms took up more than half the family’s income for the month.

Summary Image

Clearly, there are many pros and cons of school uniforms. But, one thing I did realize when researching for this article was that there are a lot of differing opinions within the research. Some research papers (such as the one by NAESP that I cited several times) appear very biased toward school uniforms. And some academic studies found conflicting information, particularly around whether uniforms increased grades.

In other words, it seems like a lot of these arguments are philosophical and hypothetical. People can land on either side of the mandatory school uniforms debate depending on their own values, opinions, and backgrounds.

Another thing I found really interesting personally was that my friends who didn’t wear uniforms as kids looked at uniforms negatively – they saw them as tools for suppression of creative expression and even referred to them as looking a little communist! By contrast, my friends who wore uniforms as kids were much more positive toward them.

For me, this shows just how much our backgrounds and experiences have conditioned us to sit on one side of the debate or the other. So, I’d encourage you to genuinely think about the other perspective and see if you can come to the debate with as neutral and open a mindset as possible (if that’s possible at all!).

Scholarly Sources and Studies Cited

Baumann, C. & Krskova, H. (2016). School discipline, school uniforms and academic performance. International Journal of Educational Management , 30 (6), pp. 1003-1029. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJEM-09-2015-0118

Firmin, M., Smith, S. & Perry, L. (2006). School Uniforms: A Qualitative Analysis of Aims and Accomplishments at Two Christian Schools, Journal of Research on Christian Education, 15(2), 143-168. https://doi.org/10.1080/10656210609485000

Gregory, S. L. (2013). Perceptions of High School Students of the Impact of a School Uniform Policy . PhD Dissertation. University of Arkansas. https://scholarworks.uark.edu/etd/592

Han, S. (2010). A mandatory uniform policy in urban schools: Findings from the school survey on crime and safety: 2003-04.  International Journal of Education Policy and Leadership ,  5 (8). https://doi.org/10.22230/ijepl.2010v5n8a253

Mahling, W. (1996). Scondhand Codes: An Analysis of the Constitutionality of Dress Code in the Public Schools. Minnesota Law Review,  80 (1): 715. https://scholarship.law.umn.edu/mlr/2492

Morris, E. (2005). ‘Tuck in That Shirt!’ Race, Class, Gender, and Discipline in an Urban School. Sociological Perspectives. 48(1): 25-48. https://doi.org/10.1525%2Fsop.2005.48.1.25

Nathan, N., McCarthy, N., Hope, K. et al. (2021). The impact of school uniforms on primary school student’s physical activity at school: outcomes of a cluster randomized controlled trial. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity , 18 (17). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12966-021-01084-0

National Association of Elementary School Principals. (2013). The Right Fit: Principals on School Uniforms. Communicator , 36 (12). https://www.naesp.org/resource/the-right-fit-principals-on-school-uniforms/

Sanchez, J. E., Yoxsimer, A., & Hill, G. C. (2012). Uniforms in the Middle School: Student Opinions, Discipline Data, and School Police Data. Journal of School Violence , 11 (4), 345-356. https://doi.org/10.1080/15388220.2012.706873

Velder, J. (2012). An Analysis of the Implementation and Impact of School Uniforms on Graduation and Discipline Rates in a Unified School . PhD Dissertation. Northwest Missouri State University). https://www.nwmissouri.edu/library/ResearchPapers/2012/Velder,%20Jessica.pdf

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Chris Drew (PhD)

Dr. Chris Drew is the founder of the Helpful Professor. He holds a PhD in education and has published over 20 articles in scholarly journals. He is the former editor of the Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education. [Image Descriptor: Photo of Chris]

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Do uniforms make schools better?

by: Marian Wilde | Updated: March 1, 2024

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Schools, parents, and students frequently clash over the issue of regulating what students may and may not wear to school. These controversies often pegged to the culture war of the moment touch on everything from gender and sexuality to politics, race, and religion. In 2021, a group of about 50 students in Georgia protested their middle school’s dress code for being discriminatory against BIPOC girls by wearing t-shirts every Friday emblazoned with the words “sexist,” “racist,” and “classist.” In 2022, a fight between students, staff, and police officers broke out at a Pennsylvania high school when hats and hoodies were banned as part of a revision by the school board to the school’s dress code. And in 2023, two Michigan middle schoolers, via their mother, sued their school district after they were banned from wearing “Let’s Go Brandon” sweatshirts.

Are school uniforms the best solution to this contentious debate? If every student is wearing the same outfit, will a host of campus problems be solved? Researchers are divided over how much of an impact — if any — dress policies have on student learning. There are multiple studies with conflicting conclusions, plus books such as 2018’s The Debate About School Uniforms , but the argument wears on, with a list of pros and cons on each side.

Why do some public schools have uniforms?

In the 1980s, public schools were often compared unfavorably to Catholic schools. Noting the perceived benefit that uniforms conferred upon Catholic schools, some public schools decided to adopt a school uniform policy.

President Clinton provided momentum to the school uniform movement when he said in his 1996 State of the Union speech, “If it means teenagers will stop killing each other over designer jackets, then our public schools should be able to require their students to wear school uniforms.”

The pros and cons of school uniforms

According to proponents, school uniforms:.

• Help prevent gangs from forming on campus

• Encourage discipline

• Help students resist peer pressure to buy trendy clothes

• Help identify intruders in the school

• Diminish economic and social barriers between students

• Increase a sense of belonging and school pride

• Improve attendance

Opponents contend that school uniforms:

• Violate a student’s right to freedom of expression

• Are simply a Band-Aid on the issue of school violence

• Make students a target for bullies from other schools

• Are a financial burden for poor families

• Are an unfair additional expense for parents who pay taxes for a free public education

• Are difficult to enforce in public schools

Uniforms vs. dress codes

Schools and districts vary widely in how closely they adhere to the concept of uniformity.

What’s a dress code?

Generally, dress codes are more relaxed than uniform policies. Sometimes, however, dress codes are quite strict with requirements that are potentially viewed as biased based on race or gender. In 2020, two Black male students in Texas, cousins with West Indian heritage, were suspended for wearing dreadlocks in supposed violation of the district’s hair and grooming policy, part of the dress code. The elder one, a senior, was told he couldn’t attend prom or graduation until his dreads were trimmed. In 2022, girls on the track team at an Albany, NY high school were sent home for wearing sports bras at practice.

Uniforms are certainly easier for administrators to enforce than dress codes, largely because the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) can be depended upon to protect a student’s “right to express themselves.” The ACLU believes dress codes are often used to, “shame girls, force students to conform to gender stereotypes… punish students who wear political and countercultural messages. Such policies can be used as cover for racial discrimination… Dress codes can also infringe on a student’s religious rights…” To successfully enforce a dress code, insists the ACLU, the school must prove the student’s attire, “is disruptive to school activities.”

The ACLU’s dress code stance is regularly supported by federal courts , like the 2023 lower court ruling in North Carolina that ended a charter school decree that girls couldn’t wear pants to school. ACLU lawyers claimed this violated Title IX because the dress code “discriminated against female students by limiting their ability to fully participate in school activities, such as using the playground.” The U.S. Supreme Court later declined to take up a case challenging the lower court’s ruling.

Check with your school to see what the dress code is, as they can be fairly specific. In Tulsa, Oklahoma, for example, the dress code prohibits :

• Symbols, mottoes, words or acronyms that convey crude, vulgar, profane, violent, death-oriented, gang-related, sexually explicit, or sexually suggestive messages.
• Symbols, mottoes, words or acronyms advertising tobacco, alcohol, or illegal drugs or drug paraphernalia.
• Symbols, mottoes, words or acronyms identifying a student as a member of a secret or overtly antisocial group or gang or that identifies a student as a member of an organization that professes violence or hatred toward one’s fellow man.
• Visible and permanent tattoos/brands incompatible with the standards set forth herein shall be covered to prohibit their display.
• Excessively large or baggy clothes

What’s a uniform?

School uniforms worldwide can widely range from nondescript to bizarre. (Extreme examples from China, Australia, and the UK on this YouTube video ) Most public school outfits in the USA are quite casual, with a “ common type ” for boys often a polo shirt in a solid color, with pants in khaki, black, or navy blue. A girl’s uniform is often a skirt and a white buttoned-up shirt. Dress shoes are frequently required for both genders.

In the United States, low-income families spend an average of $249 on a child’s school uniform annually, far less than the typical Australian student’s $578. But still, the cost is sometimes viewed as unfair because public education is intended to be free, paid by tax dollars, not “a stress for families on lower incomes.” The ACLU believes that public schools should provide free school uniforms , because the expense is unconstitutional, and it increases wealth inequity.

What research says about school uniforms

In 2006, Virginia Draa, professor at Youngstown State University, reviewed the impact of school uniforms at 64 public high schools that had larger percentages of economically disadvantaged and minority students than other urban schools. Her conclusion surprised her: “I really went into this thinking uniforms don’t make a difference, but I came away seeing that they do… I was absolutely floored.” Her analysis determined that the schools with uniforms improved their students attendance, and graduation rates rose an average almost 11 percent.

In 2022, Ohio State University and University of Pennsylvania researchers reached a contrary opinion in their report titled “ School Uniforms and Students Behavior: Is There a Link? ” Their view was that, in general, evidence that school uniforms improve social skills in the students was “inconclusive.” The solitary praise they provided to uniform-wearing was noting there was “some indication that low-income students in schools that required uniforms demonstrated better school attendance than low-income students in schools that did not.”

What to believe? Jury is still out.

What do students think about uniforms?

A student discussion: pros and cons of uniforms

Editor’s note: This video is part of our high school milestones series about communication skills. The students in this video discuss the pros and cons of school uniforms.

A University of Nevada, Reno, survey of 1,848 middle school students, published in 2022, revealed that 90 percent did not like wearing a uniform to school . Only 30 percent believed the uniforms “might reduce discipline issues, a mere 17 percent thought the uniform helped them focus at school, 34 percent believed their school was safer due to the uniforms and 37 percent said, “I worry less about my appearance” due to the uniform requirement.”

An earlier study, also in Nevada, displayed similar unpopularity with newly instituted uniforms among middle school students. However, when the researchers looked into school discipline and local police records and compared them to the prior year’s data, discipline referrals were down 10 percent, there were 63 percent fewer police log reports, and incidences of graffiti, fights, and gang-related activity were all down.

It’s a big issue

A new trend is the mounting pressure to establish dress codes for teachers. Apparently, the same casual mindset toward revealing outfits is cropping up in the ranks of our teachers.

The debate over uniforms in public schools encompasses many larger issues than simply what children should wear to school. It touches on issues of school improvement, freedom of expression, and hot-button culture wars. It’s no wonder the debate rages on.

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Argumentative Essay: School Uniform

The idea of school uniforms seems like an antiquated concept for many North Americans. Unless a child attends private school, it is not normally practiced by children and families. Yet around the world, wearing school uniforms is the norm. Students studying in schools requiring school uniforms generally perform very well academically and seem happy wearing the same outfit every day. There are many benefits to wearing school uniforms that schools in Canada and the United States should incorporate into their public schools.

One of the biggest concerns in schools these days is bullying . Students are harassed physically, verbally, and socially. The latest trend in bullying is cyberbullying. Often, the cause of bullying stems from people being different for not wearing the “right” clothes. If someone looks richer, most people feel like they have a higher social status or more power. To the contrary, uniforms allow children to learn on a more level playing field, with less judgment about clothing choices, brands of clothing, or physical appearance.

A lot of students who wear uniforms claim that they feel more proud of their school. Wearing school colors gives students a feeling of being more connected to their school and classmates. If there is a sense of community and connectedness among the students, the use of foul language, gang behavior, and crimes like vandalism are largely eliminated. Wearing school uniforms can also help people gain more self-confidence because they know they are a part of something bigger.

One of the main concerns people have about wearing school uniforms is conformity. People fear that by making children look the same, their individuality will be suppressed. However, this is not the case. Accessories, such as bracelets and hair clips, can jazz up a school uniform. Besides, students can wear their own clothing after school and during weekends. An individual’s personality is not wholly expressed by fashion alone. Personality is determined by the way a person moves, feels, thinks, and talks. Wearing a school uniform neither defines a child’s personality nor erases it.

There are even more advantages to wearing school uniforms in public schools in addition to those previously mentioned. It means lower costs for parents during back-to-school shopping. However, the idea that bullying might be alleviated is the leading reason why schools should implement the wearing of uniforms. The other is the fostering of school pride. Students will not lose their personality but will merely learn new ways to express themselves.

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Expert Commentary

School uniforms: Do they really improve student achievement, behavior?

This updated collection of research looks at how mandatory school uniforms impact student achievement, attendance and behavior as well as the presence of gangs in public schools.

Republish this article

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License .

by Denise-Marie Ordway, The Journalist's Resource April 20, 2018

This <a target="_blank" href="https://journalistsresource.org/education/school-uniforms-research-achievement/">article</a> first appeared on <a target="_blank" href="https://journalistsresource.org">The Journalist's Resource</a> and is republished here under a Creative Commons license.<img src="https://journalistsresource.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/cropped-jr-favicon-150x150.png" style="width:1em;height:1em;margin-left:10px;">

Decades ago, uniforms were mostly worn by students who went to private or parochial schools. But as local school boards have focused more on improving standardized test scores and campus safety, a growing number have begun requiring school uniforms — typically, a polo shirt of a particular color paired with navy or khaki pants, skirts or shorts. Nearly 22 percent of public schools in the United States required uniforms in 2015-16 — up from almost 12 percent in 1999-2000, according to the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES).

Proponents argue that students will pay more attention to their classwork if they aren’t preoccupied with fashion, and that they’ll be better behaved. Meanwhile, school administrators say uniforms help eliminate gang-related styles and logos. They also make it easier to spot a stranger on campus.

Despite their reported benefits, mandatory uniforms are controversial because a lot of parents and students don’t like the idea of forcing children to dress alike, which they say suppresses freedom of expression. Some families complain about the financial burden of purchasing uniforms in addition to their kids’ other clothing. Years ago, parents also complained that it was difficult to find uniforms, but that ceased to be an issue after large chain stores like Target and Wal-Mart began selling them.

As public schools debate the merits of uniforms — some school boards have been bouncing the idea around for years — it’s important for journalists to know what the research says on this topic. School officials do not always consult academic research before they put a plan on the table.

To help journalists ground their reporting and fact-check claims, Journalist’s Resource has rounded up several academic studies worth reviewing. Reporters may also want to examine reports on uniform use from the NCES, which collects and reports data related to school uniforms, dress codes and book bags in public schools.

——————————–

 “School Discipline, School Uniforms and Academic Performance” Baumann, Chris; Krskova, Hana. International Journal of Educational Management , 2016. DOI: 10.1108/IJEM-09-2015-0118.

Summary: This study examines test scores and student behavior in the United States, Canada and 37 other countries to determine whether uniforms affect student discipline. The researchers found that the highest-performing students are the most disciplined. In addition, “for countries where students wear school uniforms, our study found that students listen significantly better, there are lower noise levels, and lower teaching waiting times with classes starting on time.”

“Dressed for Success? The Effect of School Uniforms on Student Achievement and Behavior” Gentile, Elizabetta; Imberman, Scott A. Journal of Urban Economics , 2012, Vol. 71. doi: 10.1016/j.jue.2011.10.002.

Abstract: “Uniform use in public schools is rising, but we know little about how they affect students. Using a unique dataset from a large urban school district in the southwest United States, we assess how uniforms affect behavior, achievement and other outcomes. Each school in the district determines adoption independently, providing variation over schools and time. By including student and school fixed-effects we find evidence that uniform adoption improves attendance in secondary grades, while in elementary schools they generate large increases in teacher retention.”

“Uniforms in the Middle School: Student Opinions, Discipline Data, and School Police Data” Sanchez, Jafeth E.; Yoxsimer, Andrew; Hill, George C. Journal of School Violence , 2012. DOI: 10.1080/15388220.2012.706873.

Summary: Researchers asked students at an urban middle school in Nevada what they thought of having to wear uniforms. Their public school had adopted a uniform policy after staff members became frustrated with the earlier dress code policy, which resulted in girls wearing revealing clothing and boys wearing shirts with inappropriate messages and images. The study’s main takeaway: The vast majority of students said they dislike uniforms, although some agreed there were benefits. “For example, in reference to gender, more than expected females than males indicated students treated them better with uniforms. Also, fewer females than males got detention for not wearing a uniform or for wearing a uniform inappropriately.”

“Are School Uniforms a Good Fit? Results from the ECLS-K and the NELS” Yeung, Ryan. Educational Policy , 2009, Vol. 23. doi: 10.1177/0895904808330170.

Abstract: “One of the most common proposals put forth for reform of the American system of education is to require school uniforms. Proponents argue that uniforms can make schools safer and also improve school attendance and increase student achievement. Opponents contend that uniforms have not been proven to work and may be an infringement on the freedom of speech of young people. Within an econometric framework, this study examines the effect of school uniforms on student achievement. It tackles methodological challenges through the use of a value-added functional form and the use of multiple data sets. The results do not suggest any significant association between school uniform policies and achievement. Although the results do not definitely support or reject either side of the uniform argument, they do strongly intimate that uniforms are not the solution to all of American education’s ills.”

“Effects of Student Uniforms on Attendance, Behavior Problems, Substance Use, and Academic Achievement” Brunsma, David L.; Rockquemore, Kerry A. The Journal of Educational Research , 1998, Vol. 92. doi: 10.1080/00220679809597575.

Abstract: “Mandatory uniform policies have been the focus of recent discourse on public school reform. Proponents of such reform measures emphasize the benefits of student uniforms on specific behavioral and academic outcomes. Tenth-grade data from The National Educational Longitudinal Study of 1988 was used to test empirically the claims made by uniform advocates. The findings indicate that student uniforms have no direct effect on substance use, behavioral problems, or attendance. Contrary to current discourse, the authors found a negative effect of uniforms on student academic achievement. Uniform policies may indirectly affect school environment and student outcomes by providing a visible and public symbol of commitment to school improvement and reform.”

“School Uniforms, Academic Achievement, and Uses of Research” Bodine, Ann. The Journal of Educational Research , 2003, Vol. 97. doi: 10.1080/00220670309597509.

Abstract: “School uniforms are being advocated for a range of social, educational, economic, and familial reasons. In 1998, The Journal of Educational Research (The JER) published an article by D. Brunsma and K. Rockquemore that claims that uniforms correlate negatively with academic achievement, but data presented in this article actually show positive correlation between uniforms and achievement for the total sample, and for all but 1 school sector. Examination of structure of argument reveals that the erroneous claim results from misleading use of sector analysis. Simultaneous with The JER article, and on the basis of the same National Education Longitudinal Study: 1988 database, an Educational Testing Service article reported that no correlation exists between uniforms and achievement. The two articles are contrasted in this study. The effect of new communication technology in amplifying political uses of academic research is discussed.”

“Public School Uniforms: Effect on Perceptions of Gang Presence, School Climate, and Student Self-Perceptions” Wade, Kathleen Kiley; Stafford, Mary E. Education and Urban Society , 2003, Vol. 35. doi: 10.1177/0013124503255002.

Abstract: “This study attempts to clarify the relationships between public school uniforms and some of their intended results: student self-worth and student and staff perceptions of gang presence and school climate. The instruments used in the study included a questionnaire on gang presence and identity, the National Association of School Principals Comprehensive Assessment of School Environments, and the Harter Self-Perception Profile for Children. Participants consisted of 415 urban public middle school students and 83 teachers. Findings indicate that, although perceptions did not vary for students across uniform policy, teachers from schools with uniform policies perceived lower levels of gang presence. Although the effect size was small, students from schools without uniforms reported higher self-perception scores than students from schools with uniform policies. Student and teacher perceptions of school climate did not vary across uniform policy.”

“The Effect of Uniforms on Nonuniform Apparel Expenditures” Norum, Pamela S.; Weagley, Robert O.; Norton, Marjorie J. Family & Consumer Sciences , 1998. doi: 10.1177/1077727X980263001.

Abstract: “The uniform industry has grown steadily the past 20 years with increased attention from employers trying to create a professional image among workers as well as school administrators considering uniforms to curtail school violence. Although an important part of human dress for centuries, uniforms have received little attention from researchers of the clothing market. This study examines the impact of uniform purchases on household expenditures for selected nonuniform apparel subcategories based on an economic model of conditional demand. Expenditure equations are estimated using the 1990-1991 Consumer Expenditure Survey. The results suggest that, on average, consumers do not substitute uniforms for other apparel purchases. Rather, uniforms and nonuniform apparel appear to be complements in consumers’ purchases, resulting in greater household expenditures on nonuniform apparel. These results are a first step in understanding the economic effect that uniform purchases, mandated by employers, schools, or others, have on household clothing expenditures.”

Looking for more research on student achievement? Check out our write-ups on how teacher salaries , school vouchers and school shootings impact learning.   

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The Downsides of School Uniforms

By Mark Oppenheimer

My daughter’s school uniform, required by the public magnet middle school where she began sixth grade last week, is perfectly nice. It’s not so much a single uniform as a broad wardrobe of coördinated prep-wear: skirts or pants, paired with piqué polo shirts, all in “goldenrod yellow,” navy, or white, topped off by a fleece zip-up (on which the school crest is optional). For her first day, she chose the navy skirt with the white polo. As she walked to the corner to catch the bus, I was reminded of a time when our schools were orderly, our teachers respected, and our children all above average.

That was an imaginary time, of course, but nostalgia for it has helped to create the modern school-uniform movement, which has won the kind of broad—indeed, nearly uniform—support that exists for no other educational policy, or social policy, that one can think of. Although there isn’t a scholarly consensus that uniforms do anything to improve student achievement or school climate, about one-fifth of all public-school students now wear them. They are one of the few interventions on which charter-school advocates and anti-charter activists agree.

Even the students have gone along, in one of the great surrenderings of liberty in modern history. For, although we think of uniforms as a reclamation of the olden days, they are relatively new in this country. Against British Commonwealth traditions, we were the free and easy New World, the country where children dressed themselves. For the most part, the appearance of students was governed only by the nagging of parents (“Get a haircut!”); informal norms (T-shirts were for athletics, not the school day); and deference to teachers and principals, who had wide discretion to tell a boy that he looked like a hoodlum, or tell a girl that her hemline was inappropriately short.

In the sixties, students fought for more autonomy in dress, to signal allegiance to a particular band or clique or general attitude toward the world. They saw dress as a mode of expression in schoolyard politics, and in world politics: in 1969, in Tinker v. Des Moines, the Supreme Court upheld high-school students’ rights to wear black armbands to protest the Vietnam War. That case was the capstone for an emerging jurisprudence of freedom-in-attire, coming after court decisions in New York and Idaho striking down bans on women wearing pants, and a decision in New Hampshire ending a ban on bluejeans. These cases helped solidify a trend toward more freedom for young people to dress how they wished. And so it was, from the nineteen-seventies into my childhood, in the nineteen-eighties.

Then Bill Clinton happened. In 1996, Clinton, running for reëlection and eager to shore up his conservative credentials, championed mandatory school uniforms “as the kind of small-bore, low-cost, common-sense policy initiative that might appeal to a broad cross-section of voters,” as the legal scholars Deborah M. Ahrens and Andrew M. Siegel write, in their forthcoming paper “Reconsidering the Constitutionality of Student Dress Restrictions.” Clinton plugged uniforms in his State of the Union address that year and had his Department of Education issue a manual for schools that were transitioning to require uniforms. While some schools had experimented with uniforms in the eighties and nineties, it’s clear, Ahrens and Siegel argue, that “the modern enthusiasm for uniforms can be traced pretty directly to the 1996 Clinton administration initiative.”

Expecting some pushback, the Department of Education issued guidelines for making the new uniform policies able to withstand lawsuits. Except the free-expression lawsuits never came. As with other policies favored by conservatives, such as law-and-order policing and mass incarceration, Clinton’s support gave cover to liberals, desperate for any policies that might help the inner cities, to join the act. As one might expect, school uniforms, while growing in popularity everywhere, have really become a feature of poor schools. According to a 2016 study by the National Center for Education Statistics, school uniforms are required at fifty-three percent of schools where three-quarters of students are eligible for free or reduced lunch. But, of schools where fewer than a quarter of students are so eligible, only four per cent require uniforms.

These uniforms have become a rich revenue source for kiddie-clothing companies like French Toast, which has a verbose Web site dedicated to their magical properties. One typical section makes the argument that “school uniforms bring an image of success to students and teachers.” But that depends how one defines success. In Silicon Valley, on Ivy League campuses, and even in a growing number of white-shoe firms, the rule is to dress down. While once upon a time each profession had its uniform—the gray-flannel suit, the white coat—today, the most successful people wear what they want, especially in the more creative industries.

On the Web site for my daughter’s school, the hyperlink “Click here for more information about student uniforms!” redirects to Lands’ End. Once known for its middle-quality oxford button-downs, Lands’ End has become a major player in the school-uniform game, and not by accident. It has aggressively formed partnerships with school systems, often becoming their main uniform purveyor, and it has helped fund some of the questionable research adduced to show that uniforms improve schools. In 2013, Lands’ End helped pay for a survey by the National Association of Elementary School Principals that found that eighty-five per cent of principals “and other school leaders” believed that uniforms improved classroom discipline.

Many school leaders believe that uniforms help, although they can’t seem to agree on why. It’s student achievement, or “school pride,” or a perceived reduction in fighting. When independent researchers have tried to quantify such claims, they have had mixed results. One widely cited study, on schools in Long Beach, California, showed a decrease in school crime after the introduction of uniforms, but the city had taken many other measures to reduce violence at the same time, so it’s hard to tease out how much uniforms mattered. Many studies show no change in school culture, and some even show negative results: in one 2007 study , the introduction of uniforms accompanied an increase in the average number of assaults in one district’s violent schools.

One good friend of mine, a superintendent of a charter-school network, who spoke to me off the record, swears that introducing uniforms where he works changed the culture overnight, increased respect, and improved students’ ability to learn. He may be right. And, if uniforms are viewed positively by students, parents, and administrators alike—as they are—then it can seem precious to object to them. To some extent, enthusiasm about school culture is a good in itself; even if it doesn’t yield higher test scores or graduation rates, perhaps it leads to better teacher retention or recruitment. Maybe the aesthetics of color-coördinated order just make everyone in the building happier. One 2002 study of Texas middle-school students found that those in uniform had a stronger sense of “belonging” in their school community. That’s worth something.

But, so long as the evidence for these claims is thin, I am more concerned about what we know to be true: that uniforms are yet one more way that the surveillance of the un-powerful—the poor, people of color, and that great unheard group of the young—has become increasingly acceptable. “Campuses increasingly subject students to police surveillance techniques, including drug-sniffing dogs, metal detectors, surveillance cameras, random sweeps for contraband including bag searches, and drug tests,” Ahrens and Siegel write. As students become “proper subjects for policing,” they argue, it’s no surprise that we presume to tell them what to wear.

Uniforms can be liberating, in the way that the absence of choice is. My daughter is only a few days into her school year, yet she already says that uniforms simplify her morning. But, as our society reckons once more with the costs and burdens of free expression, we should remember that not so long ago teen-agers fought for their right to black armbands. While in theory the right to such overt political expression—the armband, the political button or patch—would still be upheld by courts, the spirit behind that freedom has disappeared. We’ve stopped thinking of our sons and daughters as citizens whose independence we want to cultivate by, as much as possible, getting out of the way.

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School Uniform Debate

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Proponents of school uniforms, opponents of school uniforms, impact on academic performance.

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Home » Tips for Teachers » Why Students Should Not Wear Uniforms: A Thoughtful Exploration with 9 Reasons, Studies and Statistics

Why Students Should Not Wear Uniforms: A Thoughtful Exploration with 9 Reasons, Studies and Statistics

In the ongoing debate about school uniforms, a significant voice often goes unheard – that of the students themselves. The argument against mandatory school uniforms is not just about fashion or personal preferences; it delves deeper into fundamental issues of self-expression, equity, and the very purpose of education. This article, “Why Students Should Not Wear Uniforms,” seeks to uncover the less discussed but crucial aspects of this debate, presenting a comprehensive view that challenges the traditional perspective favoring uniforms.

At the core of the anti-uniform stance is the belief in the importance of individuality and personal growth during the formative years of schooling. Uniforms, often seen as a tool for homogenization, can stifle the self-expression and creativity that are essential in nurturing young minds. By enforcing a standard mode of dress, schools may inadvertently suppress the diversity and individuality that should be celebrated within educational environments. Moreover, the imposition of uniforms can raise significant financial burdens for families, create unnecessary resistance to authority, and overlook important cultural and religious considerations.

I am seething about this poor young girl who has been put in isolation because she’s not wearing a school uniform bought from the right place, school uniforms are far too expensive for a lot of people in this country in the most ridiculous you can get just as good from supermarke — James Whale (@THEJamesWhale) September 17, 2023

This article aims to explore these perspectives, offering insights into why the policy of mandatory school uniforms might be an outdated approach that overlooks the broader objectives of education and personal development. As we delve into this topic, we invite readers to reconsider the conventional wisdom on school uniforms and reflect on the potential benefits of a more flexible and inclusive approach to student attire.

After reading this article you’ll know:

• Educator and Industry Expert Perspectives →
• 9 Reasons Why Students Should Not Wear Uniforms →
• Opposing Perspectives on School Uniforms →

Uniforms in Education: Educator and Industry Expert Perspectives

Teachers and educational experts are increasingly questioning the rising trend of school uniforms in U.S. public schools. While the period from 1999-2000 to 2017-18 saw an increase from 12% to 20% in schools adopting uniforms, there’s growing concern about their impact on student individuality and expression. In 2015-2016, uniform policies were enforced in 25% of public primary schools, 20% of middle schools, and 12% of high schools, with a notable prevalence in urban and high-poverty schools . Experts argue that such policies, while aiming for uniformity, might inadvertently suppress student creativity and self-identity, vital for holistic educational development.

Here’s the perspective of educational field experts on the matter:

“I completely disagree with uniforms on every level. Supporters of uniforms say that they reduce bullying with regards to fashion, but there is a great deal of evidence that says it just pushes that bullying underground. Instead of being bullied about something superficial like the shirt you are wearing, bullies just go to the tried and true body image shaming. Glass? Overweight? Acne? Too many freckles? Hair colour? Too tall? Too short? What school administrators see is a surface level reduction in bullying, followed by them patting themselves on the back and ignoring the problem completely.” — Scooter Campbell , assistant language teacher

“While uniforms are supposed to build a sense of community, they may have the opposite effect. Fashion is one way that students express themselves, and that may be an important part of the school experience. When students can’t show their individuality, they may not feel like they belong as much. School uniforms may not be the most effective way to improve student behavior and engagement.” — Arya Ansari, assistant professor of human sciences at The Ohio State University

“I really don’t care whether or not a student’s shirt is tucked in, as long as they are learning. I don’t care whether or not a student has on the right belt, as long as I can’t see their underwear. I don’t care if a boy has earrings, facial hair, or painted nails, as long as he’s not painting them in my class. I don’t care if a girl has bright pink hair, a tank top, and ripped jeans, as long as bosoms and butt cheeks are covered and secure. I don’t like hoodies on heads in my classroom because it makes it too easy to hide Airpods, but I don’t care if the sweatshirt has a hood. As long as it’s not a top hat or sombrero that blocks the view of the students behind them, I don’t care if my students wear hats or beanies in my class.” — New Orleans Mom Guest Author

The video below explores the debate on the impact of school uniforms on academic performance. It delves into whether mandating uniforms in schools truly enhances students’ learning and overall academic success.

Want to know how to be a strict teacher? Read our dedicated article .

9 Reasons Why Students Should Not Wear Uniforms

Let’s explore the reasons against mandating school uniforms for students. Understanding these arguments provides valuable insights into the broader educational and social implications of uniform policies.

1. Expression of Individuality

The concept of “Expression of Individuality” in the context of school uniforms is a vital aspect of student development and autonomy. When schools impose uniforms, they inadvertently restrict a key channel through which students express their individuality and creativity. This freedom of expression is not merely about fashion or aesthetics; it’s a crucial part of a student’s journey towards self-discovery and confidence building.

Key aspects of individuality expression through clothing include:

• Personal Identity Formation: Choosing what to wear allows students to explore and affirm their personal identities and tastes.
• Creativity and Innovation: Fashion is a form of art. Allowing students to select their own clothes fosters creativity and innovation, skills highly valued in many aspects of life and work.
• Cultural Expression and Diversity: Clothing can be a powerful expression of cultural heritage. A diverse dress code celebrates and acknowledges the rich tapestry of cultures in the student body.

Beyond these points, individuality in clothing choices helps prepare students for future environments where they must make decisions about their personal and professional presentation. In many modern workplaces, the ability to express oneself appropriately through attire is valued and can impact career progression and personal branding.

Furthermore, enforcing a uniform policy can subtly imply that conformity is more important than individual thought and expression. This is at odds with the educational goal of fostering independent, critical thinkers who will contribute uniquely to society.

In essence, the freedom to choose one’s attire is not just a matter of personal taste but a crucial element in nurturing confident, creative, and culturally aware individuals. Schools, by embracing this diversity in student clothing, can enhance the educational experience and better prepare students for the varied and diverse world beyond their gates.

2. Financial Burden

The requirement of school uniforms can impose a significant financial burden on families, an aspect that often gets overlooked in the uniform policy debate. In the United States, over half of parents , at 55%, perceive school uniforms to be costly. This financial strain is not just about the initial cost of purchasing uniforms, but also encompasses several hidden expenses that accumulate over time.

Key points illustrating the financial burden of school uniforms include:

• Initial and Replacement Costs: Uniforms, especially those with specific designs or logos, can be expensive to buy. Additionally, as children grow or uniforms wear out, they often need replacing, adding to the financial strain.
• Multiple Sets Requirement: To maintain a clean and presentable appearance throughout the week, families typically need to purchase multiple sets of uniforms, further escalating the cost.
• Special Care and Maintenance: Some uniforms require special laundering or care, which can add to the overall expense, either in terms of higher home utility bills or professional cleaning services.

Moreover, these costs can be particularly burdensome for families with multiple children or those on a limited income. Research from the University of York highlighted that school uniforms present unmanageable costs for low-income families. The study found that purchasing uniforms imposed sudden and significant financial burdens, leading families to make sacrifices on essentials like food and heating, and in some cases, to enter into debt.

In addition to the direct financial impact, there’s also the consideration of opportunity cost. Money spent on uniforms could have been allocated to educational resources, extracurricular activities, or savings for future educational expenses.

In conclusion, the mandatory school uniform policy can lead to significant and often underappreciated financial pressures on families, making it a substantial reason for reconsidering such policies, especially in schools that serve economically diverse or disadvantaged communities.

3. Comfort and Practicality

The issue of comfort and practicality is a significant concern in the debate against mandatory school uniforms. Students spend a substantial part of their day in school, and their attire plays a crucial role in their overall comfort and ability to engage effectively in various school activities.

Key aspects highlighting the importance of comfort and practicality include:

• Physical Comfort: Uniforms, often designed with a one-size-fits-all approach, may not suit every body type, leading to discomfort. Comfortable clothing is essential for students to focus and participate actively in their learning.
• Suitability for Varied Activities: School life involves a range of activities, from sitting in classrooms to physical education and outdoor play. Uniforms might not be practical for all these diverse activities, impacting students’ ability to participate fully.
• Weather Appropriateness: Uniforms may not be designed for all weather conditions, which can affect students’ comfort and health. For example, a uniform might be too warm for summer months or insufficiently protective during colder weather.

Additionally, practicality concerns extend to the maintenance of uniforms. They often require regular washing and ironing, which can be time-consuming for families. Also, the need for specific uniform attire for different school events or days (e.g., physical education uniforms) adds to the complexity and impracticality of the uniform system.

In essence, prioritizing comfort and practicality in student attire is not only a matter of convenience but also impacts their academic engagement and well-being. Allowing students to wear clothing that is comfortable, suited to a variety of activities, and appropriate for the weather can enhance their school experience, making them more receptive to learning and participating in school life.

4. Lack of Preparation for Real World

The argument that school uniforms do not adequately prepare students for the ‘real world’ is increasingly relevant in today’s diverse and flexible professional environment. In many modern workplaces, the ability to choose and present oneself appropriately is a valued skill, reflecting individual judgment and adaptability.

Key points underscoring this lack of preparation include:

• Diversity in Workplace Attire: Modern workplaces often have varied dress codes, ranging from formal to casual. Uniform policies do not expose students to the decision-making process involved in dressing for different occasions and environments.
• Personal Branding: In many careers, personal style is an integral part of professional branding. Uniforms do not allow students to explore and develop their personal style, which can be a disadvantage in professions where self-presentation is key.
• Adaptability and Decision-Making: Choosing appropriate attire for different settings teaches adaptability and decision-making skills. Uniforms eliminate these daily choices, potentially leaving students less prepared to make such judgments post-graduation.

Norman Isaacs, the principal at Millikan Middle School in Sherman Oaks, California, opposes school uniforms . He argues that students should be taught to make decisions and choices rooted in their own values instead of adhering to arbitrary rules. He believes this approach is essential for students to develop independent thinking and self-discipline.

In conclusion, while uniforms might simplify wardrobe decisions during school years, they can inadvertently hinder the development of skills necessary for navigating the varied and often nuanced dress codes encountered in adult life, especially in professional settings. Allowing students the freedom to choose their attire is more aligned with preparing them for the real-world scenarios they will face after graduation.

5. Equality Issues

The topic of equality in relation to school uniforms is multi-faceted and complex. While uniforms are often championed as a tool for promoting equality, they can, in fact, inadvertently highlight and exacerbate existing socioeconomic disparities among students.

Key points illustrating the equality issues associated with school uniforms include:

• Highlighting Economic Disparities: The quality, newness, and upkeep of uniforms can become a marker of economic status. Students from less affluent backgrounds may struggle to keep their uniforms in pristine condition, inadvertently highlighting socio-economic differences.
• Access to Uniforms: The cost of uniforms can be prohibitive for some families, particularly those with multiple school-age children, leading to inequality in access.
• Uniform Assistance Programs: While some schools offer uniform assistance programs, reliance on such programs can inadvertently stigmatize students, creating a sense of otherness rather than unity.

Moreover, the notion that uniforms inherently promote a sense of equality among students is debatable. While uniforms may superficially level the playing field by unifying student attire, true equality and respect among students stem from an inclusive school culture that values diversity, not just from masking individual differences with standard clothing. For example, in schools like Archer , the uniform policy doesn’t restrict branded shoes or accessories, allowing students to display wealth through these items. This often leads to a sense of inequality, as students become aware of and feel pressured by the presence of expensive items, undermining the supposed leveling effect of uniforms.

In summary, while the intention behind school uniforms may be to create a level playing field, they can sometimes have the opposite effect by highlighting economic disparities and creating barriers to access. A more effective approach to promoting equality in schools involves addressing these deeper issues directly, rather than masking them with a uniform policy.

6. Resistance to Authority

The imposition of school uniforms can sometimes foster resistance to authority among students, particularly as they grow older and seek to assert their independence and individuality. This resistance is not just a matter of rebellion; it often stems from deeper feelings of autonomy and self-expression being suppressed.

Key points related to resistance to authority include:

• Asserting Independence : As children mature into teenagers, they naturally seek to express their individuality. Uniforms can be perceived as a restriction on this expression, leading to resistance as a form of asserting independence.
• Questioning Rules and Uniformity: Older students often begin to question the rationale behind various rules, including dress codes. Mandatory uniforms can become a focal point of this questioning, symbolizing a broader struggle against perceived unnecessary authority.
• Impact on Student-Teacher Relationships: Strict uniform policies can create an adversarial dynamic between students and school authorities, impacting the overall school environment and student-teacher relationships.

The resistance to uniforms and, by extension, to school authority, can have wider implications. It can detract from the educational experience, creating an environment of conflict and tension rather than one of learning and growth. Additionally, this resistance can carry over into other aspects of school life, affecting participation in school activities, respect for school rules, and overall school morale.

In essence, while the aim of school uniforms may be to promote discipline and unity, they can sometimes yield the opposite result, particularly among older students. Recognizing and respecting students’ growing need for self-expression and autonomy is crucial in fostering a positive and productive school atmosphere.

7. Cultural and Religious Concerns

Addressing cultural and religious concerns is crucial when considering the impact of mandatory school uniforms. Uniform policies can sometimes conflict with students’ cultural and religious practices, leading to feelings of exclusion and a lack of representation.

Key points highlighting cultural and religious concerns include:

• Respect for Cultural Attire: Many cultures have traditional attire that holds significant meaning. Uniform policies can prevent students from wearing these culturally important garments, leading to a loss of cultural expression.
• Accommodating Religious Dress Requirements: Some religions have specific dress codes, such as headscarves or particular garments. Uniforms that don’t accommodate these requirements can impede religious freedom and expression.
• Impact on Inclusivity and Diversity: A uniform policy that doesn’t consider cultural and religious diversity can create an environment where students feel their identities are not acknowledged or respected.

Furthermore, navigating these cultural and religious nuances requires sensitivity and understanding from educational institutions. When schools fail to accommodate such diversity, it can lead to a sense of alienation among students from different cultural or religious backgrounds. This alienation can affect their sense of belonging and engagement within the school community.

In summary, while school uniforms are often intended to create a cohesive and unified appearance, they can inadvertently undermine the rich cultural and religious diversity within the student body. An inclusive approach that respects and accommodates these differences is essential for fostering an educational environment that values and celebrates diversity.

8. Psychological Impact

The psychological impact of school uniforms on students is an important aspect to consider, particularly as it pertains to their self-image, confidence, and overall mental well-being. Uniforms, by their very nature of imposing a standard appearance, can have various unintended negative psychological effects on students.

Key points regarding the psychological impact include:

• Self-Image and Confidence: Uniforms can affect how students perceive themselves, especially if they feel the uniform is unflattering or doesn’t reflect their identity. This can lead to issues with self-esteem and confidence.
• Conformity vs. Individuality: The emphasis on conformity through uniforms may conflict with a student’s desire for individual expression, leading to internal conflict and stress.
• Stress on Families: The pressure to maintain a set standard of uniform can also place stress on families, particularly if they struggle financially or have time constraints, affecting the student’s home life and mental well-being.

Additionally, unflattering or restrictive uniforms can deter students from participating in sports , creating a psychological barrier. For example, an auto-ethnography highlighted the psychological barrier posed by an unflattering sports uniform to fat children’s participation in and enjoyment of physical activity.

In conclusion, while uniforms are often intended to eliminate distractions and create equality, they can have significant psychological impacts on students. These impacts can range from affecting self-esteem and personal identity to creating stress and anxiety. Considering these factors is crucial in evaluating the overall effectiveness and appropriateness of uniform policies in schools.

9. Not Environmentally Friendly

The environmental impact of school uniforms is an often overlooked yet critical aspect of the debate surrounding their use. The production, maintenance, and disposal of school uniforms carry significant environmental implications, making them a less sustainable option for student attire.

Key points highlighting the environmental concerns include:

• Resource-Intensive Production: The manufacturing of uniforms often involves resource-intensive processes, using materials that are not environmentally friendly and consuming large amounts of water and energy.
• Frequent Replacement and Waste: As children grow, uniforms need frequent replacing, contributing to textile waste. Unlike everyday clothing, which can be handed down or repurposed, specific school uniforms have limited use beyond the school environment.
• Chemical Usage in Maintenance: The maintenance of uniforms, especially those requiring special care, can involve the use of harsh chemicals and detergents, further contributing to environmental harm.

Furthermore, the environmental impact of uniforms extends beyond their production and maintenance. The disposal of outdated or worn-out uniforms poses a challenge, as they are often not made from biodegradable or recyclable materials, adding to landfill waste.

In summary, considering the environmental footprint of school uniforms is essential in the context of growing concerns about sustainability and environmental conservation. Moving towards more eco-friendly clothing options or implementing uniform recycling programs could be steps in mitigating the environmental impact associated with school uniforms.

Addressing Opposing Perspectives on School Uniforms

While the debate around school uniforms has varying opinions, it’s essential to consider the opposing views. Below, we explore common arguments in favor of mandating school uniforms, coupled with counterarguments that provide a different perspective on the issue.

1. Uniforms Save Time

The perceived time-saving aspect of school uniforms is often debated. While it’s argued that uniforms can save time in choosing outfits for school, this benefit is minimal as students still need casual attire for outside school hours.

Furthermore, uniforms can actually add to the workload of teachers . They often spend a significant amount of time enforcing uniform policies and addressing infractions such as improper dress. This enforcement can detract from the primary focus of teaching and reduce the time available for actual lesson delivery.

2. Uniforms Improve Attendance and Discipline

Proponents of school uniforms often claim they instill discipline by requiring students to adhere to dress codes. However, true discipline is more effectively cultivated through internal motivation and understanding the reasons behind rules , rather than mere conformity to a uniform. Encouraging critical thinking and self-discipline is more beneficial for students’ overall development.

This perspective is supported by research using data from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study , which showed that school uniforms had no effect on students’ behavior across various dimensions, including internalizing and externalizing behavior problems, and social skills. This finding was consistent through kindergarten to the end of fifth grade, even after accounting for a range of factors that could influence behavior.

3. Improving Safety and Security

The argument that uniforms aid in identifying who belongs on campus and enhance security is subject to debate. While it may assist in spotting intruders, a more effective approach to safety involves a robust security system and active community engagement.

Fostering a safe school environment is better achieved through open communication and trust among students, staff, and the community. The effectiveness of uniforms in improving security is not universally acknowledged and is often viewed as a measure to enforce conformity rather than a genuine strategy to enhance safety.

Interested in exploring different teaching methods? Take a look at our comprehensive guide featuring 15 distinct teaching styles.

Useful Resources

• National Center for Education Statistics
• School uniforms: A history of ‘rebellion and conformity’ by BBC
• Educational Statistics by Statista

The case against school uniforms is compelling. Uniforms often fail to achieve their intended goals of promoting equality, saving time, and enhancing safety. Instead, they may inadvertently perpetuate socioeconomic disparities, add burdens to educators and students alike, and provide a false sense of security. Emphasizing personal expression, fostering genuine equality, and focusing on more effective educational strategies would be more beneficial for student development and school environments.

If you want to learn more about dress code for teachers, check out our article “ How to Meet the Teacher Dress Codes in Diverse Learning Environments in 2023″ .

• “Back-to-school: share of children wearing school uniforms in the United States from 2008 to 2018”, Statista
• “School uniforms”, National Center for Educational Statistics
• “Dressed for Success? The Effect of School Uniforms on Student Achievement and Behavior”, National Bureau of Economic Research
• “Do you think students need to wear a school uniform? Why or why not?”, Quora
• Department of Human Sciences, The Ohio State University
• “Dress Code, Stress Mode: A Teacher’s Perspective on the Uniform Debate”, New Orleans Mom
• “School Uniforms Are Expensive Statistics [Fresh Research]”, Gitnux
• “Buying school uniform post-lockdown ‘unmanageable’ for low income families”, phys.org
• “School Uniforms: Do They Reduce Violence–Or Just Make Us Feel Better?”, EdWeek
• “Do uniforms really create socioeconomic equity?: Designer items while in uniform”, The Oracle
• “Reviewing School Uniform through a Public Health Lens: Evidence about the Impacts of School Uniform on Education and Health”, Public Health Reviews
• “School uniforms save time”, Parlia
• “Early Childhood Longitudinal Program (ECLS)”, National Center for Educational Statistics
• “School Uniforms: A Safety and Security Issue”. The Raider Voice
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Purdue Online Writing Lab Purdue OWL® College of Liberal Arts

Organizing Your Argument

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How can I effectively present my argument?

In order for your argument to be persuasive, it must use an organizational structure that the audience perceives as both logical and easy to parse. Three argumentative methods —the  Toulmin Method , Classical Method , and Rogerian Method — give guidance for how to organize the points in an argument.

Note that these are only three of the most popular models for organizing an argument. Alternatives exist. Be sure to consult your instructor and/or defer to your assignment’s directions if you’re unsure which to use (if any).

Toulmin Method

The  Toulmin Method  is a formula that allows writers to build a sturdy logical foundation for their arguments. First proposed by author Stephen Toulmin in  The Uses of Argument (1958), the Toulmin Method emphasizes building a thorough support structure for each of an argument's key claims.

The basic format for the Toulmin Method  is as follows:

Claim:  In this section, you explain your overall thesis on the subject. In other words, you make your main argument.

Data (Grounds):  You should use evidence to support the claim. In other words, provide the reader with facts that prove your argument is strong.

Warrant (Bridge):  In this section, you explain why or how your data supports the claim. As a result, the underlying assumption that you build your argument on is grounded in reason.

Backing (Foundation):  Here, you provide any additional logic or reasoning that may be necessary to support the warrant.

Counterclaim:  You should anticipate a counterclaim that negates the main points in your argument. Don't avoid arguments that oppose your own. Instead, become familiar with the opposing perspective.   If you respond to counterclaims, you appear unbiased (and, therefore, you earn the respect of your readers). You may even want to include several counterclaims to show that you have thoroughly researched the topic.

Rebuttal:  In this section, you incorporate your own evidence that disagrees with the counterclaim. It is essential to include a thorough warrant or bridge to strengthen your essay’s argument. If you present data to your audience without explaining how it supports your thesis, your readers may not make a connection between the two, or they may draw different conclusions.

Example of the Toulmin Method:

Claim:  Hybrid cars are an effective strategy to fight pollution.

Data1:  Driving a private car is a typical citizen's most air-polluting activity.

Warrant 1:  Due to the fact that cars are the largest source of private (as opposed to industrial) air pollution, switching to hybrid cars should have an impact on fighting pollution.

Data 2:  Each vehicle produced is going to stay on the road for roughly 12 to 15 years.

Warrant 2:  Cars generally have a long lifespan, meaning that the decision to switch to a hybrid car will make a long-term impact on pollution levels.

Data 3:  Hybrid cars combine a gasoline engine with a battery-powered electric motor.

Warrant 3:  The combination of these technologies produces less pollution.

Counterclaim:  Instead of focusing on cars, which still encourages an inefficient culture of driving even as it cuts down on pollution, the nation should focus on building and encouraging the use of mass transit systems.

Rebuttal:  While mass transit is an idea that should be encouraged, it is not feasible in many rural and suburban areas, or for people who must commute to work. Thus, hybrid cars are a better solution for much of the nation's population.

Rogerian Method

The Rogerian Method  (named for, but not developed by, influential American psychotherapist Carl R. Rogers) is a popular method for controversial issues. This strategy seeks to find a common ground between parties by making the audience understand perspectives that stretch beyond (or even run counter to) the writer’s position. Moreso than other methods, it places an emphasis on reiterating an opponent's argument to his or her satisfaction. The persuasive power of the Rogerian Method lies in its ability to define the terms of the argument in such a way that:

• your position seems like a reasonable compromise.
• you seem compassionate and empathetic.

The basic format of the Rogerian Method  is as follows:

Introduction:  Introduce the issue to the audience, striving to remain as objective as possible.

Opposing View : Explain the other side’s position in an unbiased way. When you discuss the counterargument without judgement, the opposing side can see how you do not directly dismiss perspectives which conflict with your stance.

Statement of Validity (Understanding):  This section discusses how you acknowledge how the other side’s points can be valid under certain circumstances. You identify how and why their perspective makes sense in a specific context, but still present your own argument.

Statement of Your Position:  By this point, you have demonstrated that you understand the other side’s viewpoint. In this section, you explain your own stance.

Statement of Contexts : Explore scenarios in which your position has merit. When you explain how your argument is most appropriate for certain contexts, the reader can recognize that you acknowledge the multiple ways to view the complex issue.

Statement of Benefits:  You should conclude by explaining to the opposing side why they would benefit from accepting your position. By explaining the advantages of your argument, you close on a positive note without completely dismissing the other side’s perspective.

Example of the Rogerian Method:

Introduction:  The issue of whether children should wear school uniforms is subject to some debate.

Opposing View:  Some parents think that requiring children to wear uniforms is best.

Statement of Validity (Understanding):  Those parents who support uniforms argue that, when all students wear the same uniform, the students can develop a unified sense of school pride and inclusiveness.

Statement of Your Position : Students should not be required to wear school uniforms. Mandatory uniforms would forbid choices that allow students to be creative and express themselves through clothing.

Statement of Contexts:  However, even if uniforms might hypothetically promote inclusivity, in most real-life contexts, administrators can use uniform policies to enforce conformity. Students should have the option to explore their identity through clothing without the fear of being ostracized.

Statement of Benefits:  Though both sides seek to promote students' best interests, students should not be required to wear school uniforms. By giving students freedom over their choice, students can explore their self-identity by choosing how to present themselves to their peers.

Classical Method

The Classical Method of structuring an argument is another common way to organize your points. Originally devised by the Greek philosopher Aristotle (and then later developed by Roman thinkers like Cicero and Quintilian), classical arguments tend to focus on issues of definition and the careful application of evidence. Thus, the underlying assumption of classical argumentation is that, when all parties understand the issue perfectly, the correct course of action will be clear.

The basic format of the Classical Method  is as follows:

Introduction (Exordium): Introduce the issue and explain its significance. You should also establish your credibility and the topic’s legitimacy.

Statement of Background (Narratio): Present vital contextual or historical information to the audience to further their understanding of the issue. By doing so, you provide the reader with a working knowledge about the topic independent of your own stance.

Proposition (Propositio): After you provide the reader with contextual knowledge, you are ready to state your claims which relate to the information you have provided previously. This section outlines your major points for the reader.

Proof (Confirmatio): You should explain your reasons and evidence to the reader. Be sure to thoroughly justify your reasons. In this section, if necessary, you can provide supplementary evidence and subpoints.

Refutation (Refuatio): In this section, you address anticipated counterarguments that disagree with your thesis. Though you acknowledge the other side’s perspective, it is important to prove why your stance is more logical.  

Conclusion (Peroratio): You should summarize your main points. The conclusion also caters to the reader’s emotions and values. The use of pathos here makes the reader more inclined to consider your argument.  

Example of the Classical Method:  

Introduction (Exordium): Millions of workers are paid a set hourly wage nationwide. The federal minimum wage is standardized to protect workers from being paid too little. Research points to many viewpoints on how much to pay these workers. Some families cannot afford to support their households on the current wages provided for performing a minimum wage job .

Statement of Background (Narratio): Currently, millions of American workers struggle to make ends meet on a minimum wage. This puts a strain on workers’ personal and professional lives. Some work multiple jobs to provide for their families.

Proposition (Propositio): The current federal minimum wage should be increased to better accommodate millions of overworked Americans. By raising the minimum wage, workers can spend more time cultivating their livelihoods.

Proof (Confirmatio): According to the United States Department of Labor, 80.4 million Americans work for an hourly wage, but nearly 1.3 million receive wages less than the federal minimum. The pay raise will alleviate the stress of these workers. Their lives would benefit from this raise because it affects multiple areas of their lives.

Refutation (Refuatio): There is some evidence that raising the federal wage might increase the cost of living. However, other evidence contradicts this or suggests that the increase would not be great. Additionally,   worries about a cost of living increase must be balanced with the benefits of providing necessary funds to millions of hardworking Americans.

Conclusion (Peroratio): If the federal minimum wage was raised, many workers could alleviate some of their financial burdens. As a result, their emotional wellbeing would improve overall. Though some argue that the cost of living could increase, the benefits outweigh the potential drawbacks.

Module: Academic Argument

Practice: argumentative thesis statements, learning objectives.

• Recognize an argumentative thesis
• Evaluate an argumentative thesis

In the practice exercises below, you will use the information you learned in the previous reading to help you recognize and evaluate argumentative thesis statements. Keep in mind that a sound argumentative thesis should be debatable, assertive, reasonable, evidence based, and focused.

• Practice: Argumentative Thesis Statements. Provided by : University of Mississippi. License : CC BY: Attribution
• Argumentative Thesis Activity. Provided by : Excelsior College. Located at : http://owl.excelsior.edu/argument-and-critical-thinking/argumentative-thesis/argumentative-thesis-activity/ . Project : Excelsior OWL. License : CC BY: Attribution

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8.1: Literary Analysis Arguments

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Analysis means to break something down in order to better understand how it works. To analyze a literary work is to pull it apart and look at its discrete components to see how those components contribute to the meaning and/or effect of the whole. Thus, a literary analysis argument considers what has been learned in analyzing a work (What do the parts look like and how do they function?) and forwards a particular perspective on their contribution to the whole (In light of the author’s use of diction, for example, what meaning does the novel, as a whole, yield?).

Consider, once again, the literary analysis arguments presented in this book so far:

Marion Velis (Chapter 2): “At first glance, Theodore Roethke’s poem ‘My Papa’s Waltz’ may seem like a poem about a boy’s fear of his controlling, abusive, alcoholic father. But the poem goes much deeper than that. Roethke uses specific rhythm, word choice, and a controlling metaphor to give the poem a reminiscent tone that looks back on the father in love.”

Bill Day (Chapter 5): “Through the metaphors of Jake’s wound and the tainted Pamplona fiesta, the novel [The Sun Also Rises] conveys the possibility that we can dangerously disrupt the cycle of renewal.”

Katherine Jones (Chapter 5): “Brett, as she is developed in the novel [The Sun Also Rises], has been painted in different lights, depending on the interpreter, ranging from a sympathetic view to one of condemnation. The portrait of her that I will attempt to show is one of a human being, caught between the ideologies of two eras.”

Each of these essays engages in analysis of the text in question, pointing to and considering plot events, images, character traits, dialogue, and other components of the work to understand the meaning of the text as a whole. Although in her thesis, Katherine does not list the “parts” that her paper investigates, she goes on to focus on Brett’s specific behaviors and expressions that support the essay’s interpretation of The Sun Also Rises.

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How to Write an Essay Introduction

The introduction is arguably the most important part of an essay. It sets the tone for the entire piece, grabs the reader's attention, and lays out the main argument. A good introduction not only engages the reader but also guides them into the heart of your essay. UK Writings is an excellent write my essay company . For students who need help with refining their introduction writing skills, reading a UKWritings review can offer valuable insights into the reputation and reliability of this paper writing service. In this post, we'll explore some key tips and strategies to help you write a compelling and effective introduction for your essays.

Understand the Purpose of an Introduction

Before we dive into the specifics, it's essential to understand the primary purpose of an essay introduction. An introduction serves three main functions:

• Hook the reader: The introduction should pique the reader's interest, making them want to read further.
• Provide background information: It should provide context and background information necessary for the reader to understand the topic and the essay's main argument.
• State the thesis: The introduction should clearly present the essay's main argument or thesis statement.

Start With a Compelling Hook

The first few sentences of your introduction are crucial in capturing the reader's attention. You want to start with a compelling hook that piques their interest and makes them want to continue reading. Here are some effective ways to begin your introduction:

• Startling fact or statistic : Presenting a surprising or thought-provoking fact or statistic related to your topic can immediately grab the reader's attention. Example: "Every year, over 8 million tons of plastic end up in our oceans, posing a serious threat to marine life."
• Rhetorical question: Asking a thought-provoking question that relates to your topic can engage the reader and make them think about the issue. Example: "Have you ever wondered how our reliance on single-use plastics is impacting the environment?"
• Quotation : Using a relevant quotation from a respected source can add credibility and intrigue to your introduction. Example: "As Jane Goodall famously said, 'What you do makes a difference, and you have to decide what kind of difference you want to make.'"
• Anecdote or personal story : A brief, relevant anecdote or personal story can help the reader connect with your topic on a more personal level. Example: "When I was a child, I remember being fascinated by the vibrant colors and intricate patterns of the coral reefs during a family vacation to the Great Barrier Reef."

Set the Context and Provide Background Information

After capturing the reader's attention with a compelling hook, your introduction should provide essential background information and context to help the reader understand the topic and its significance. This background information should be concise and relevant, setting the stage for your main argument without delving too deeply into details.

When providing background information, consider:

• Historical context: If your topic has a historical aspect, briefly explain the relevant historical events or circumstances.
• Definitions: Define any key terms or concepts that the reader might not be familiar with.
• Scope: Clarify the scope of your essay and the specific aspect or angle you'll be exploring.
• Significance: Explain why your topic is important or relevant and why the reader should care.

Example: "Plastic pollution has become a major environmental concern in recent decades. As our reliance on single-use plastics has increased, so too has the amount of plastic waste ending up in our oceans, landfills, and natural environments. This plastic pollution not only poses a threat to marine life but also has far-reaching consequences for human health and the planet's ecosystems."

State Your Thesis Statement

The thesis statement is the backbone of your essay, and it should be clearly stated in the introduction. Your thesis statement should concisely summarize the main argument or central idea of your essay. It should be specific, focused, and debatable, providing a clear roadmap for the rest of your essay.

When writing your thesis statement, consider:

• Main argument: What is the main point or argument you'll be making in your essay?
• Scope: What specific aspect or angle of the topic will you be focusing on?
• Significance: Why is your argument important or relevant?

Example: "Therefore, it is crucial that we take immediate and decisive action to reduce our reliance on single-use plastics and implement effective strategies to combat plastic pollution in our oceans and natural environments."

Structure and Transitions

While the content of your introduction is essential, the structure and flow are equally important. A well-organized introduction should have a logical progression, guiding the reader smoothly from the hook to the background information and finally to the thesis statement.

To achieve a cohesive structure, use appropriate transitions and signpost words to connect your ideas and guide the reader through your introduction. For example, you could use phrases like "In recent years," "Moreover," "Additionally," or "Therefore" to link your sentences and ideas together.

Example: "In recent years, plastic pollution has become a major environmental concern. Moreover, as our reliance on single-use plastics has increased, so too has the amount of plastic waste ending up in our oceans, landfills, and natural environments. Additionally, this plastic pollution not only poses a threat to marine life but also has far-reaching consequences for human health and the planet's ecosystems. Therefore, it is crucial that we take immediate and decisive action to reduce our reliance on single-use plastics and implement effective strategies to combat plastic pollution in our oceans and natural environments."

Length and Placement

While there is no strict rule on the length of an introduction, a general guideline is to keep it between 10-20% of the total word count of your essay. This ensures that your introduction is substantial enough to provide the necessary background and context without being too long or overwhelming.

It's also important to note that the introduction should be placed at the beginning of your essay, serving as the first section before the body paragraphs and conclusion.

Revise and Refine

Writing a strong introduction is an iterative process, and it's essential to revise and refine your introduction as you write and revise your essay. As you develop your ideas and arguments, you may need to adjust or refine your introduction to better align with the content and direction of your essay.

Don't be afraid to revise your introduction multiple times until you're satisfied that it accurately reflects the focus, tone, and main argument of your essay.

A well-written introduction is the key to capturing your reader's attention and setting the stage for a compelling and persuasive essay. By following these tips and strategies, you can create an introduction that hooks the reader, provides essential context, and clearly states your thesis statement. Remember to start with a compelling hook, provide relevant background information, create a focused thesis statement, maintain a logical structure, and revise and refine your introduction as needed. With a strong introduction in place, you'll be well on your way to writing a successful and impactful essay.

Should Students Wear School Uniforms Essay (Tips and Sample)

School uniforms are a hotly contested debate, which makes it a controversial topic preferred for school essays. Even though writing a school uniform essay should be easy, students' confessions after being assigned both long and short essays on school uniform show mixed results. Most students who have been given an essay on school uniforms have highlighted it as exciting and tricky.

Well, to write an essay that will score you an excellent grade, you need to understand your perspective, viewpoint, or stand before writing. As yourself, whether you will support school uniforms or you will be against them in your essay.

In most cases, the essay can be argumentative where you argue either for or against, then proceed to state your stand on whether or not you support school uniforms in learning institutions. You can also write an informative essay or a persuasive school uniform essay.

This article covers some aspects to consider when writing such an essay, some suitable topics, and general advice on how to write an outstanding school uniforms essay.

How to begin a School Uniforms Essay

You aim to demystify the school uniforms debate. Therefore, you need to strategize on how to begin the essay. Like other essays, starting with an essay hook would make it interesting to the readers. After the hook, head straight to writing some background information on school uniforms. You can then incorporate a thesis statement that presents your central stance on the paper.

Here is a sample school uniform hook:

A recent study by North Dakota State University revealed that an average American household spends close to 3.8% of their income on clothing, translating to approximately $2000 annually per household.

The hook above is essential when you argue from a cost perspective where you say that school uniforms save families from expenditures on buying different clothes for kids, which equalizes the rich and poor households.

In your background, you can try reference instances when school uniforms have stirred public debates. Inform your reader about these debates and highlight the key issues you will handle in your essay.

At the end of the introduction paragraph, state your thesis statement.

What goes to the body of a school uniform essay?

With the introduction done, you now need to develop the body paragraphs. As a general rule, always maintain a single idea per paragraph. If you are doing your essay in a five-paragraph essay format, ensure that the body of your essay takes 80% of the total word count while the introduction and the conclusion each take 10%.  

Here are some key ideas you can incorporate in the body of your essay:

• Explain the essence of having school uniforms on students, teachers, and learning institutions. Issues such as security and safety, uniformity, and promoting togetherness or unity as benefits. It is easy to spot a student in uniform. School uniforms also enforce some self-respect and self-worth among students. As well, uniforms foster a sense of belonging among students.
• Explore the issue from a cost-saving perspective for the parents. Unlike having different clothes daily, having a few pieces of school uniforms reduces the expenditure per household.
• Connect school uniforms to issues such as creativity, comfort, and affordability. Lack of funds, for instance, can hinder some families from sending their children to school as they have no school uniforms.
• You can also present the pros and cons of school uniforms
• Connect the school uniforms to identity formation
• School uniforms equalize students, which boosts their self-confidence
• School uniform makes students not be imaginative
• In the end, present recommendations that can solve the school uniform quagmire in schools

Like any other essay, ensure that your essay about school uniforms is engaging. Take a multi-stakeholder approach if you are recommending a policy.

If you have real-life examples of how school uniforms are beneficial, present them to support your body paragraphs. As you strive to present your viewpoints, ensure that each paragraph transitions to the next paragraph.

If possible, benchmark your arguments on schools that have successfully implemented school uniforms.

How to end an essay on school uniform

Like the introduction, the conclusion of your essay matters a lot. It can be the only place a marker checks to know what your stance was when writing your school uniforms essay.

Let your readers know whether school uniforms are good or not. Do not just stop there explore the why and why not for each of your points.

If there are recommendations, especially if you were writing an essay based on a school uniforms case study, present them in the conclusion.

DO not introduce new ideas that are not in your essay. However, crystalize and relate to your thesis and make sure your readers enjoy your essay to the last dot.

Sample School Uniforms Essay Topics

School uniform essays differ in perspective or stance, which hugely depends on the choice of topic. We can advise you to choose a school essay topic that has practical points and one that you can support with evidence from scholarly literature.

• Is school uniform a good thing?
• The importance of school uniforms
• Should students wear uniforms?
• Pros and Cons of school uniforms
• The negative impacts of school uniforms
• Rhetorical analysis of school uniforms
• Positive effects of school uniforms
• Are school uniforms a dress for success?
• Why schools should have uniforms
• History of school dress code
• School uniforms in private and public schools
• Should all schools have the same uniform?
• Are school uniforms necessary?
• School uniforms and diversity
• School uniforms and student discipline
• Comparison of school uniforms in U.S. and Japan

School Uniforms Essay Check List

With your essay written, ensure that it ticks most if not all these lists of facts that make a school uniform score great grades.

• Does the essay have a great hook?
• Is the background of your introduction relatable to the selected topic?
• Does the introduction have supporting facts from scholarly sources?
• Does your introduction have a clear thesis statement?
• Is the main idea clearly illustrated in the body?
• Does each body paragraph have an idea of its own?
• Does the essay have transition words for effective flow?
• Does the body discuss important concepts?
• Is the body paragraph having an opening sentence, facts, and closing sentence?
• Has all borrowed information been cited?
• Does the essay have strong evidence?
• Is the essay grammatically correct?
• Is the conclusion a summary of the argument?
• Has the thesis been restated?
• Is the conclusion flowing with the body of the essay?
• Has the essay used formal language?
• Are the sentences free from unnecessary words?
• Is the grammar and spelling in the essay correct?
• Are the references correct?
• Are the references recent?
• Are the sources used credible?
• Does the essay have a title and reference page?

Sample Argumentative Essay on Should Students Wear School Uniforms

Disclaimer – DO NOT COPY this sample essay. It is meant to help you see how you can present your essay ideas given your perspective/viewpoint. Submitting any part of this essay as your own might land you in trouble. We will not be in any way be a party to such consequences. If you need a model essay based on your selected topic for research purposes, please place an order or contact our support team for assistance with outlines, potential references, and some ideas on writing an excellent essay on school uniforms.

Numerous debates have been carried out on whether students should wear uniforms or not. Parents, teachers, students, and school administrations have all given their views on school uniforms with different arguments and opinions on all sides. Supporters of school uniforms argue that school uniforms are essential as they give students an identity and foster discipline, while others argue that uniforms are annoying, uncomfortable, and lack creativity. Regardless of the position one takes on students wearing uniforms, it is clear that uniforms are an essential part of students, and students wearing uniforms is more advantageous to both the students and schools. Thus, all students should wear uniforms as the uniforms instill a sense of discipline and identity, erase differences between the students, and are less costly (thesis statement)

School uniforms eliminate the differences between students in regard to their social and economic backgrounds ( School uniforms promote equality ) . Schools have students from different social and economic backgrounds. The school environment has students from both poor and rich families. Hence, uniforms are important as they are modest and identical clothing that propagate a sense of equality among the students (Freeburg and Workman, 6). Accordingly, all students should wear school uniforms to avoid a situation where some students feel inadequate for being able to afford expensive clothing like their more affluent counterparts. A learning environment and education, in general, are supposed to bridge the social-economic differences that exist in society.

Parents can save much money that would otherwise go to buying a wide variety of school clothes for their children ( school uniforms save parents money spent on clothing ). School uniforms provide a cheaper and more consistent alternative to regular clothing. If students are allowed to wear regular clothing to school, parents and guardians have to buy clothes that are in line with the latest fashion trends and the individual tastes of their children, both of which can be expensive. In this case, students should wear school uniforms that are affordable and identical to save parents money that can be used for more important things (Baumann and Krskova 1003). Affordability is essential for parents considering the enormous expenses associated with bringing up children in the modern era. Therefore, all students should wear uniforms as uniforms protect the financial interest of the parents and guardians.

Wearing school uniforms saves teachers, students, and administrators valuable time ( Bringing in the time-saving perspective of school uniforms ). Without uniforms, teachers and schools, administrators spend significant amounts of time regulating the dress code. For instance, time wasted deciding which clothes are appropriate, what skirt-size is too short, among other issues that arise in regulating regular clothes to make appropriate for the school environment (Ruggerone 573). Such challenges would not exist if all students wore uniforms. Consequently, students also waste valuable time because of the distractions that might be caused by clothes that their peers are wearing. Therefore, to eliminate time wastage and distractions in school, students should wear uniforms.

According to individuals and parties who oppose school uniforms, the uniforms limit the personal expression of students and can forcibly define gender roles for the children as girls have to wear skirts and boys’ trousers ( school uniforms stifle independence and creativity) - COUNTERARGUMENT . People express themselves through their clothes, which means that forcing students to wear uniforms affects their personal expressions (Masuch and Hefferon 227). Additionally, uniforms are gender-specific, which means that they can negatively impact the personalities of students as they are forced to wear uniforms that they do not feel reflect what they want to be or do with their lives. Thus, as the proponents against school uniforms argue, uniforms should be eliminated as they infringe on the independence of young students.

To sum up, there are numerous arguments that either support or oppose the wearing of uniforms by students. Supporters of school uniforms claim that uniforms give students a sense of identity and discipline, enhance social and economic equality, and save costs. On the other side, proponents against school uniforms claim that school uniforms limit the personal expression of students and force them into specified gender roles. Judging from the advantages and disadvantages of uniforms, it is clear that all students should wear uniforms as they distinguish students from civilians and enhance equality in the school environment.

Baumann, Chris, and Hana Krskova. "School discipline, school uniforms, and academic performance." International Journal of Educational Management 30.6 (2016): 1003-1029.

Freeburg, Beth W., and Jane E. Workman. "Dress Codes and Uniforms." Encyclopedia of Adolescence (2016): 1-13.

Masuch, Christoph-Simon, and Kate Hefferon. "Understanding the links between positive psychology and fashion: A grounded theory analysis." International Journal of Fashion Studies 1.2 (2014): 227-246.

Ruggerone, Lucia. "The feeling of being dressed: Affect studies and the clothed body." Fashion Theory 21.5 (2017): 573-593.

Gradecrest is a professional writing service that provides original model papers. We offer personalized services along with research materials for assistance purposes only. All the materials from our website should be used with proper references. See our Terms of Use Page for proper details.

Ukraine to allow some prisoners to enter army, as Kyiv focuses on finding needed recruits

State appears willing to cast a wider net to meet its wartime personnel needs.

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Could Ukraine really look to its prisons to field thousands of new recruits for its war with Russia?

It's a possibility, after Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy  signed legislation  last week allowing certain convicts to enlist. Several thousand prisoners are now asking to be let into the army,  according to Ukraine's deputy justice minister, Olena Vysotska.

As the war grinds into its third year, Ukraine has struggled to find the additional soldiers it needs. To get more people in uniform, the government has lowered its draft age, increased fines for draft dodgers and reminded Ukrainian men abroad of  their obligations .

• Ukraine's mobilization law now in force, sparking fears more essential workers will be drafted
• Facing hard wartime choices, Ukraine puts spotlight on men abroad who are absent from fight

But the decision to allow convicts — excluding those involved in particular  serious crimes  — to join the army is an indication that Kyiv is willing to cast a wider net to meet its wartime personnel needs. How far that will go in boosting its ranks remains to be seen.

"The army of Ukraine is facing an increasingly acute problem of personnel shortages, and the involvement of prisoners can slightly reduce the acuteness of this problem," Andrii Kharuk, a Ukrainian military historian, said via email.

Russia's approach

Ukraine's need for soldiers comes amid ongoing Russian attacks on the northeastern Kharkiv region, a situation that has commanded Kyiv's attention in recent weeks and necessitated  sending reinforcements . Regional Gov. Oleh Syniehubov said Friday that authorities have evacuated more than 11,000 people since the Russian attacks started on May 10.

The motivations for Russia's actions in the northeast have several possible explanations: Russian President Vladimir Putin has claimed Moscow wants to create a buffer zone, while some analysts suggest Russia's Kharkiv actions may be intended to divert  focus from other parts of the front line.

Russia has a population more than  three times that of Ukraine, providing an advantage in numbers when it comes to drafting potential soldiers. Yet it has also been sending Russian prisoners to Ukraine for much of the all-out invasion.

Yevgeny Prigozhin, the late founder of the paramilitary Wagner Group, made headlines in 2022 when video surfaced  showing him making a direct appeal to inmates to earn their freedom by fighting in Ukraine. He claimed  to have recruited tens of thousands of men from Russian prisons. 

Russia continues to send convicts into battle, though some reports suggest Moscow has dialled back  the terms offered to those who serve. It has also seen headline-making incidents of violence on its side of the border, involving prisoners-turned-soldiers who returned home after serving in Ukraine.

A change for Ukraine

Kharuk, the military historian, said Kyiv had its reasons for not looking to prison populations for potential recruits earlier in the conflict.

"In my opinion, at the beginning of the war, Ukraine failed to mobilize prisoners for ethical reasons," said Kharuk, who is also a humanities professor at Hetman Petro Sahaidachnyi National Army Academy in Lviv, Ukraine.

U.S. aid package delay led to battlefield advantages for Russia, says Ukraine PM

"Against the background of the mass recruitment of prisoners into the Russian army, it was important to demonstrate that Ukraine interprets service in the army as an honourable duty of a citizen, and not as a way to avoid punishment for criminal penalties."

Kyiv officials say roughly 20,000 prisoners could be eligible to pursue this route to military service, though only a fraction are expected to do so.

Two of the earliest men cleared to fight are convicted thieves who were ordered released for this purpose, Agence France-Presse reported this week. A further 50 prisoners were released so they could join the army, the Kyiv Independent  reported Friday.

The British experience from long ago

A century before the current war in Ukraine, there was another land war in Europe that demanded ever-more troops be sent into the fray.

That was the First World War, a conflict that claimed millions of lives, including those of  880,000 British forces .

Britain would end up sending convicts into the fight as the war progressed, just as Ukraine is considering today.

Cameron McKay has studied this history closely and written about how Britain came to understand it would need to source a lot more men to fight than were available at the war's outset.

• Q&A Ukraine's new mobilization bill offers no reprieve for weary troops 
• Ukraine willing to send more young people into war with Russia, but wary of impact on future population

"Manpower shortages were certainly a determinant in allowing criminals to enlist," McKay, a historian, explained via email. 

"At the beginning of the war, defendants who offered to enlist rather than be sent to prison were usually told no. However, as the war progressed, defendants were increasingly allowed to enlist."

According to his research, decision-makers in Britain saw various advantages in letting prisoners serve in the army. These included military service being viewed "as an opportunity for redemption, whilst also reducing the prison population," McKay said.

Unlike the situation in modern Ukraine, however, Britain allowed violent offenders to enlist.

Some of the arguments made against their enlistment revolved around possible resentment from fellow soldiers.

"It was also widely believed at the time that criminals lacked the selflessness needed for military service, although their readiness to enlist proved otherwise," McKay said.

Pressures on Kyiv

Oxana Shevel, an associate professor of political science at Boston's Tufts University, said the unpredictable nature of the war creates challenges for a government in Kyiv that must decide who must join the fight.

Shevel notes that the action of "conscripting a lot of people who may not want to be conscripted is not a super popular move," however necessary it may be for Kyiv's war effort. There are also unresolved issues about so-called demobilization, as some of Ukraine's soldiers have been on the front line for two-plus years , with no end in sight to their military service.

The Ukrainian-born Shevel does not see Kyiv's decision to allow prisoners into the military as particularly controversial, given that those convicted of serious crimes are excluded from service. And it's asking them to take on the same risks as anyone else helping to defend Ukraine.

• Ukrainian spy chief defiant as military grapples with shortages
• Analysis Ravaged by war, Russia's army is rebuilding with surprising speed

More generally, Shevel said political leaders in Kyiv have had to make ongoing hard choices about who to call up to the military, while balancing other considerations, such as the demographic and economic impacts that conscription poses.

But she said they've also been clear about why they can't avoid making those decisions, either, given the costs of failing to stop Russia.

"The invading army is not going to care about anybody's human rights," Shevel said.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Geoff Nixon is a writer on the national digital desk in Toronto. He has covered a wealth of topics, from real estate to technology to world events.

With files from The Associated Press

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Uncovering the brutal career of a crucial American ally.

And the hidden truths of the war in Afghanistan.

America’s Monster Who was Abdul Raziq?

Supported by

Who Was Abdul Raziq?

Uncovering the brutal career of a crucial American ally — and the hidden truths of the war in Afghanistan.

By Matthieu Aikins

Photographs by Victor J. Blue

I first heard about Abdul Raziq in early 2009, when I was a young freelance journalist newly arrived in southern Afghanistan. By chance, I had befriended two drug smugglers who told me that a powerful police commander in the area was helping them ship two metric tons of opium to Iran each month. Raziq, I learned, had a fearsome reputation in his hometown, Spin Boldak, on the border with Pakistan. Everyone I spoke to knew about the Taliban suspects tortured and dumped in the desert. Just as they knew that Raziq was a close ally of the U.S. military. My smuggler friends had offered to introduce me to Raziq, and 10 days after my arrival in Spin Boldak, he returned to town for his grandmother’s funeral.

Listen to this article, read by Peter Ganim

When I arrived at Raziq’s compound, I saw him sitting cross-legged on a carpeted platform, receiving a long line of guests. He was not what I expected. Trim and cheerful, clean-shaven and barely 30, he wasn’t much older than I, yet he was leading several thousand men under arms. I reached the front of the line, and Raziq shook my hand to welcome me before turning to the next guest. We would never get the chance to meet again, but that was the beginning of my long quest to understand the paradox he represented.

As inexperienced as I was, I knew enough to be puzzled by Raziq’s success. Why was the U.S. military, which was supposed to be supporting democracy and human rights in Afghanistan, working closely with a drug trafficker and murderer? One of his commanders, his uncle Janan, even wore a U.S. Army uniform given to him by his advisers, complete with a First Infantry Division patch and the Stars and Stripes.

Thanks to American patronage, Raziq was promoted to police chief of Kandahar and would eventually rise to the rank of three-star general. Famous across Afghanistan, he became the country’s most polarizing figure. The Taliban hated him, of course, but so did the ordinary people his commanders and soldiers extorted and abused. Journalists and human rights groups assembled damning evidence against him and warned that his brutality would backfire.

But Raziq beat back the suicide bombers and brought stability to Kandahar. In doing so, he became an icon for many war-weary Afghans who sought security at all costs. In a nation divided by ethnic and regional loyalties, you could find Raziq’s photo in taxis and at checkpoints from north to south. And he never lost his American backing: When he was assassinated by the Taliban in 2018, he was walking next to the top U.S. commander, Gen. Austin S. Miller. That day, it seemed as if half the country was in mourning; Miller hailed him as a friend and patriot.

Three years later, the United States withdrew, and the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan collapsed. I was working as a journalist in Kabul at the time, and as soon as the dust settled, I went south to Kandahar. With the fighting over, I was able to visit people and places nearly impossible to access before. Here was a chance to reckon with Raziq’s legacy. I met with survivors of torture inside his prisons and visited morgues where skeletons had been unearthed from desert graves. Like a great tree in a storm, the republic had toppled and exposed the hidden places among its roots. The American war was far more brutal than we had known.

Since then, over repeated trips to the war’s fiercest battlegrounds, I found that many of Raziq’s former police officers were willing to talk about the torture, execution and cover-ups they witnessed. I also spoke with a dozen American military officers and diplomats who worked with Raziq and obtained new documents through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit and other sources, which reveal just how much the American government knew about Raziq’s crimes. And with colleagues at The Times, I interviewed hundreds of witnesses and discovered a republican archive that exposed Afghanistan’s largest campaign of forced disappearances since the Communist coup in 1978. We documented 368 cases of people who were still missing after being abducted by Raziq’s men; the true toll was most likely in the thousands.

The scale of Raziq’s abuses, carried out with American support, was shocking. But the fact that they seem to have brought security to Kandahar has even more disturbing implications. Raziq’s story complicates the comforting belief that brutality always backfires and undermines the U.S. military’s claim to have fought according to international law. Raziq’s violence was effective because it had a logic particular to the kind of civil war that the United States found in Afghanistan, one where the people, and not the terrain, were the battlefield. The reasons for this are well documented by scholars of civil war and counterinsurgency but glossed over by our generals and politicians and obscured by the myths of American exceptionalism and our righteous war on terror.

But Raziq saw those reasons clearly. He murdered and tortured because he believed it was the only way to win against the Taliban. And America helped him do it.

Two harsh realities defined Raziq’s childhood: the war and the border.

The desert around Spin Boldak and its twinned Pakistani town, Chaman, stretches westward hundreds of miles to Iran, through vast wastes and dune seas crossed by nomads. The clans of two rival Pashtun tribes dominate the area, feuding like Hatfields and McCoys of the borderlands. Raziq was from the Achakzai, who competed with the Noorzai over land and smuggling routes.

Not long after Raziq was born in a mud-walled village, the Afghan Communists seized power in Kabul, and in response rebels rose up against the government, plunging the country into a conflict that lasted for more than four decades. Although both superpowers and neighbors like Pakistan and Iran intervened for their own ends, at heart this was a civil war fought by Afghans against Afghans for control of the state. Even at the peaks of the Soviet and American occupations, Afghans constituted a majority of casualties on each side.

In times of civil war, neighbors are often at one another’s throats because of local dynamics, even if they justify their actions through religion or nationalism. In Kandahar, many Noorzai joined with the mujahedeen rebels, who were supplied by the C.I.A. and the Pakistani military, while Raziq’s Achakzai relatives eventually sided with the Soviet-backed Communists. Raziq was still a boy when the war brought grief to his home: His father, who drove people and goods to the border, disappeared. His family was never able to find his body and blamed their tribal rivals. “The Noorzai did it,” said Ayub Kakai, Raziq’s uncle. “They threw him down a well.”

In 1991, after the Soviets cut off funding, the Communist government collapsed. Kandahar’s rival warlords carved up the province with a patchwork of checkpoints, where robbery and rape were common. Raziq’s uncle Mansoor took control on the road from Spin Boldak to the city, and Raziq, by then a teenager, joined him, attracted to the thrills of war. “Raziq loved cars and guns,” his younger cousin Arafat told me.

Three years later, an armed movement of religious students known as the Taliban rose in the farmlands west of Kandahar City and swept through the province, capturing Raziq and his uncle. They hung Mansoor from the barrel of a tank but spared young Raziq, who fled with his family across the border to Chaman. For seven years in exile, Raziq worked as a driver near the border, where he peddled used car parts.

Then came Sept. 11, 2001. For the Achakzai, the Americans’ decision to invade and depose the Taliban came as a miraculous reversal of fortune. That December, the C.I.A. and Special Forces assembled an army of exiles, with many Achakzai, including Raziq, among them. With the help of U.S. air power, they routed the Taliban and seized control of Kandahar, once again trading places with their Noorzai rivals, who escaped across the border to where the Pakistani military, playing a double game, gave them safe haven.

In the new republic, the Achakzai militia was transformed into the area’s Border Police. They partnered with American troops and were trained by contractors from Blackwater and DynCorp. Like the rest of the republican forces, their weapons, ammunition and salaries were paid for by the United States and its allies. But beneath the surface, the civil war still festered, even though the Americans saw it through stark binaries: the government versus the terrorists, the Afghans versus the Taliban.

“Our viewpoint was this was a war on terrorism or a war against a group trying to overthrow a democratic government,” said Carter Malkasian, a former State Department official who advised the U.S. military in Afghanistan for more than a decade. “We don’t want to view this as us getting involved in another country’s civil war.”

Thanks to his family connections, Raziq quickly rose through the ranks. He was a natural leader who fought fearlessly and earned the loyalty of his men. Although nearly illiterate, he had a capacious memory for places and faces and was a canny operator in the spy games and smuggling rings of the borderlands, using his illicit gains to fund a growing network of sources. Early on, Raziq learned that power would earn him money, which bought the intelligence that could attract U.S. patronage, giving him more power. American officers who worked in Spin Boldak remembered Raziq as an eager and valued partner in the hunt for the Taliban and Al Qaeda.

“My brother was very close to the Americans,” said Tadin Khan, Raziq’s younger brother. “They trusted him, and he never tried to deceive them.”

Tadin Khan, Raziq’s younger brother, in Dubai last year. “I didn’t believe it when I heard he was killed,” he said. “It was a hard day.”

Gul Seema, the first wife of Raziq, in 2023. “He was under a lot of pressure. Whenever I saw him, it seemed as if the shadow of death was looming over him,” says Seema.

Raziq was as generous with his friends and family as he was ruthless with his enemies. Not long after the Achakzai appointed him leader of their militia, Raziq’s older brother, Bacha, was gunned down in the bazaar in Chaman. “Bacha and Raziq were very close,” said Arafat, his cousin. “He was killed because of Raziq.”

Raziq blamed a tribal rival, a smuggler named Shin Noorzai. In March 2006, he kidnapped Shin and 15 people he was traveling with and shot them all in a dry riverbed near the border. The massacre led to a local outcry, and Raziq was summoned to Kabul. But President Hamid Karzai intervened to protect him, according to Western diplomats involved in the case, and he was never charged. (Through a spokesperson, Karzai declined to comment for this article.) The incident, however, made it into that year’s State Department report on human rights, the first public documentation of Raziq’s abuses.

Raziq’s role in the drug trade also attracted attention from American investigators. Although the Taliban had banned poppy cultivation, opium came roaring back under Karzai’s administration, and Spin Boldak sat on one of the main trafficking routes. Classified U.S. military and Drug Enforcement Administration reports, obtained through FOIA requests, described the involvement of Raziq and his men, detailing convoys in the desert, secret meetings and the use of green ink for letters of safe passage. One referred to Raziq as “the main drug smuggler in Spin Boldak.” (His brother Tadin denied that Raziq or anyone from his family was involved in drug trafficking, murder or other crimes. “All these accusations of corruption, smuggling and abuses are because of propaganda from the Taliban,” he said.)

As it turns out, by the time Raziq and I shook hands in 2009, the United States already knew he was accused of murder and smuggling but worked with him anyway. Yet Raziq’s position had become precarious, for the U.S. military’s concept of the war was changing. When I published an article about the accusations that fall, Raziq’s career had reached a dangerous point — one where his foreign patrons might have chosen to stop supporting him.

The U.S. war in Afghanistan was going badly. Faced with a growing insurgency that threatened the Afghan government’s survival, President Barack Obama ordered a surge of tens of thousands of troops. His generals had advised him that, fixated on the enemy, the United States had neglected the true battlefield: the hearts and minds of the Afghan people.

The surge would be guided by a military doctrine known as counterinsurgency theory, or COIN, which was held to have saved the day in Iraq. “Our strategy cannot be focused on seizing terrain or destroying insurgent forces; our objective must be the population,” Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal wrote upon taking command in 2009. The U.S.-led coalition “can no longer ignore or tacitly accept abuse of power, corruption or marginalization.”

According to “population-centric” COIN, the Afghan people had to be protected against the insurgency and motivated to support their own government. Criminal officials like Raziq threatened the legitimacy of the republic, and therefore the success of the war.

Given the hundreds of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis who died as result of the U.S. invasions, this emphasis on protecting civilians may seem hypocritical. But the laws of war, which forbid targeting noncombatants or harming prisoners, are essential to how the United States distinguishes its own use of force from that of rogue states and terrorists. “I believe the United States of America must remain a standard-bearer in the conduct of war,” Obama said as he accepted the Nobel Peace Prize the same year as the surge. “That is what makes us different from those whom we fight. That is a source of our strength.”

Since the decline of the antiwar movement after Vietnam, both the U.S. military and its liberal critics have become increasingly united in the conviction that war must be fought humanely by exempting civilians, as much as possible, from its violence — a shift, the historian Samuel Moyn has argued, that risks legitimizing endless war. Underpinning this is the assumption that there is no contradiction between waging war both lawfully and effectively. “The law of war is a part of our military heritage, and obeying it is the right thing to do,” states the U.S. military manual on the subject. “But we also know that the law of war poses no obstacle to fighting well and prevailing.”

In this vein, COIN reassured the American public that the surge would be just. Because the United States needed the support of the Afghan population, it could not just kill its way to victory. Brutality would backfire by producing more resistance. In a speech, McChrystal explained “COIN mathematics” : If a military operation killed two out of 10 insurgents, instead of eight remaining, that number was “more likely to be as many as 20, because each one you killed has a brother, father, son and friends.”

But while McChrystal took prompt steps to reduce civilian casualties from airstrikes, dealing with so-called bad actors like Raziq was not as simple. It turns out that the way the United States implemented its strategy provided a test of whether COIN really worked as promised.

The surge was focused on the two neighboring provinces in the south where Taliban activity was strongest. Both received roughly equivalent investments of troops and money. In Helmand, the Marines and the British pushed for the good governance prescribed by COIN, successfully pressuring Kabul to replace corrupt officials with technocrats.

“You didn’t have a power-broker-run government at the provincial level,” said Malkasian, who served as an adviser in Helmand. But the opposite proved true in Kandahar, where U.S. commanders prioritized security and encountered dogged pushback from Kabul on anticorruption efforts. “Kandahar was just more important for the Afghan political system, for Karzai, than Helmand was.”

As so often happened during the war, Washington’s grand strategy was interpreted by a multitude of American agencies and actors. In Kabul, specialized anticorruption and counternarcotics teams had Raziq in their sights. A D.E.A.-led republican unit seized an enormous stockpile of hashish in Spin Boldak and arrested a district police commander who ran narcotics shipments for Raziq. There were plans to go after him next.

But the Army officers working with Raziq saw things very differently. He and his men were a rare example of an effective, homegrown force that delivered security on a vital supply route. The U.S. commanders were in the middle of a high-stakes offensive against the Taliban, and their own troops’ lives were on the line. Karzai supported Raziq, and according to former military and intelligence officials, so did the C.I.A. With his cross-border networks, Raziq was a valuable source of intelligence on Taliban havens and bomb-making networks in Pakistan. And he could cross lines the United States couldn’t: A declassified military report from 2010 noted that Raziq was giving shelter to Baloch rebels fighting the Pakistani government and that he used “these tribesmen to carry out assassinations and killings in Pakistan.”

And so when, in February 2010, senior U.S. officials met to discuss action against corrupt Afghan officials, no one could agree on what to do about Raziq. “There was a lack of consensus,” according to Earl Anthony, who as deputy U.S. ambassador was a co-chair of the meeting. “Some highly valued his work on the security front against the Taliban.”

In the end, McChrystal, who declined to comment for this article, sided with his commanders on the ground. Raziq, they reasoned, could be mentored to change his ways. According to a leaked cable, the senior U.S. diplomat in Kandahar even offered to craft a media plan for him, including radio spots, billboards and “the longer-term encouragement of stories in the international media on the ‘reform’” of Raziq.

In March, McChrystal visited Raziq in Spin Boldak and posed beside him for television cameras. “I am very optimistic that with the plans that I’ve heard,” he said, as Raziq looked on smiling, “we can increase efficiency and decrease corruption.”

From that point on, the U.S. military would openly promote Raziq and make him an integral part of the surge. A series of personal advisers were brought in to coach and protect the young commander; the first was Jamie Hayes, who as a Special Forces lieutenant colonel led a team assigned to Raziq in July 2010. Shortly after he arrived, Hayes was ordered to help Raziq plan a major operation to clear Malajat, an outlying neighborhood of Kandahar City where the Taliban were entrenched.

At first, Hayes was puzzled about why Raziq and his Border Police were given the job, rather than the republican army or commandos. His superiors explained that it was a political decision by Karzai and the U.S. command. “This is a guy that we want to make successful,” Hayes recalled being told. “He’s an aggressive, strong leader that we want to make sure gets the chance to shine.”

Mazloom, a 33-year-old Taliban commander, in Panjwai District last year. He said he was tortured and blinded by a U.S.-backed militia commander from his village, who recognized him as an insurgent. “Because I wouldn’t confess,” Mazloom said, “he did this.”

John R. Allen, a retired four-star Marine general, at his home in Virginia in March. As the commander of American and allied forces in Afghanistan in 2011, Allen was confronted with evidence that Raziq’s forces were committing murder and torture. “That wasn’t why we were there fighting the war,” he said, “to keep a really bad criminal because he was helpful in fighting worse criminals.”

Raziq’s charisma undoubtedly played a role in why U.S. officers were so willing to support him. Like most of the Americans I spoke to who worked with Raziq, Hayes quickly took a shine to him. Raziq was full of enthusiasm and energy, and Hayes was especially impressed by how he seemed to genuinely care for the welfare of his men, unlike many other republican commanders.

For his part, Raziq was a careful student of his foreign patrons. “He liked to learn about what made Americans tick,” recalled Hayes, who said he was never shown evidence of Raziq’s massacres or drug smuggling. Raziq understood what American officers appreciated: hard work, aggression and loyalty. To show his gratitude, he even insisted on taking part in a medal ceremony for Hayes’s troops. “He knew them by name,” Hayes recalled.

Soon after a successful operation to clear Malajat, Hayes and his team were reassigned to train the police in the provincial capital. During the spring of 2011, the situation in Kandahar City was dire. The Taliban hammered the government with gunmen and suicide attacks and, in April, freed nearly 500 inmates after tunneling into the main prison. Police morale was abysmal. “Drug use was rampant,” Hayes said. “Discipline was poor.” In the same month as the prison break, a suicide bomber got inside police headquarters and killed the provincial commander. Hayes, who narrowly missed the bombing, helped put the chief in a body bag. He was the second in two years to be killed.

Cleaning up Kandahar might have been the toughest job in Afghanistan, and both Karzai and the U.S. command wanted Raziq to do it. He agreed to become police chief on one condition: He wanted to keep his position with the Border Police. He would wear both hats, so to speak, in order to maintain his power base in Spin Boldak and would bring his own men into the city. If Raziq was going to be sheriff in Kandahar, he was going to do it his way.

The battle Raziq faced in the provincial capital, a city of nearly 400,000, was very different from the rangy desert warfare in the borderlands: Here, a tribally and ethnically mixed population lived and worked in closely packed homes and narrow alleys, industrial zones and trucking warehouses. Hiding amid them, Taliban guerrillas, the cheriki , terrorized government supporters, leaving menacing “night letters,” assassinating civil servants and imams and deploying suicide bombers whose blasts tore apart crowded streets.

The first phase of the American COIN strategy in Kandahar had called for securing the capital. To that end, the U.S. military poured in resources, building a network of checkpoints and bases for republican forces and expanding the number of police districts from 10 to 16, each with its own substation chief. Trained and equipped by American troops and contractors, the Kandahar police more than doubled in size. Raziq was the fulcrum of it all: A team of American mentors lived next to his headquarters, and he met often with U.S. brass to coordinate operations.

Raziq’s underground enemies, the cheriki , relied on an extensive network of local supporters, many of whom cooperated out of religious and nationalist fervor. Rooting them out required accurate intelligence. And because Karzai had resisted creating a system of wartime detention, those who were caught had to be criminally prosecuted, convicted and sentenced.

But for Raziq, the republican courts, corrupt and easily intimidated, were a central reason the insurgency was thriving. Too often, Taliban suspects were freed and returned to the battlefield. In Spin Boldak, he had solved this problem by becoming judge, jury and executioner. For all their rhetoric about human rights and the laws of war, the foreigners had chosen him to pacify Kandahar. Actions spoke louder than words.

Raziq brought his Achakzai militia, in their distinct spotted uniforms, into the city and placed trusted lieutenants in key posts like the substations. Raziq didn’t seem to relish cruelty — I never heard stories of him personally torturing people, for instance — but he cultivated men who did. Some were his own cousins, like Jajo, who became notorious for the atrocities he committed as commander of District 8, a predominantly Noorzai area. (Jajo was assassinated in 2014.) According to police officers and internal United Nations documents, another relative from Spin Boldak ran death squads out of a special battalion at headquarters. “They had detective badges and guns,” one substation deputy told me. “They threw the bodies in the desert.”

These plainclothes teams roamed in cars with tinted windows, snatching suspects and taking them for da reg mela , “a sand picnic.” The desert wells and dunes hid countless corpses; others were dumped in the streets. Many bore signs of horrific torture. “I saw things which made me wonder whether a wild beast or man had done them,” Dr. Musa Gharibnawaz, who oversaw the city morgue as the director of forensic medicine, told me.

Those who survived to see formal detention were also tortured for confessions, which the courts relied on almost entirely for convictions. The police didn’t have the education or capacity to collect basic technical evidence, nor did most judges understand it. This problem was much broader than just Kandahar. The same year Raziq became police chief, investigators from the United Nations interviewed more than 300 detainees across Afghanistan and found that torture was widespread in republican detention. Their report documented beatings, electric shocks and the “twisting and wrenching” of genitals. The most severe abuses by the police were in Kandahar, where a follow-up report also noted a large number of bodies found with gunshot wounds to the chest and the head after Raziq took power; by contrast, the investigators found significantly less torture in Helmand, where the Marines had stuck to the COIN playbook.

The persistence of torture in the republic — which the U.N. continued to document until 2021 — illustrates how, in wartime, certain useful but prohibited acts can be implicitly authorized as regular practices. As the U.N. reporting makes clear, those accused of torture rarely faced punishment. Their work, which ceased after confession, was instrumental, unlike the gratuitous abuse meted out by poorly supervised American soldiers at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

In Kandahar, torture was exacerbated by the surge, which overloaded the court system with detainees captured by U.S. forces; one internal military report worried that it would most likely “produce more — perhaps far more — prisoners” than the main prison could handle. During the summer of 2011, as the U.N. prepared to publish its findings, intelligence reports from the south filtered up to Western diplomats and military leaders in Kabul. The torture of detainees had already led to scandals in Britain and Canada; now the U.S. command would be forced to take notice. For the third time in Raziq’s career, his job would hang in the balance as a result of his crimes.

On July 18, 2011, two months after Raziq became police chief, John R. Allen, then a four-star Marine general, took command of U.S. and allied forces in Afghanistan. He was shaking hands with his guests during the ceremony in Kabul when a trio of Western officials, led by a senior British diplomat, told him that they needed to speak immediately. It was about Raziq.

Alarmed by what he heard, Allen had his staff pull up the raw intelligence reporting, which described executions and torture by Raziq’s forces in Kandahar. “I wanted a sense of the frequency,” he told me. “The reporting was pretty standard and pretty awful. It had been going on for some time.”

Allen went to the presidential palace to see Karzai. “I said that he needed to be aware that he had a senior police commander who was a serial human rights violator, and he should remove him,” Allen told me.

But at that moment, Karzai needed Raziq more than ever. In the week before Allen arrived, two of the president’s most important allies in the south were killed, including his own brother. For years, Karzai had seen the United States waffle on corruption and human rights abuses, even as they partnered with warlords, and as he often had, he called the Americans’ bluff. At a follow-up meeting, Karzai told Allen that he had checked his own sources and hadn’t heard similar allegations.

Frustrated, Allen ordered the United States and its allies to stop transferring captives in the south. “Karzai wasn’t going to do anything about Raziq, and I couldn’t permit us to continue to feed detainees into his hands,” he told me. From then on, when he traveled to Kandahar, Allen made a point to dodge the young police chief, who was eager for a photo op. “I wasn’t going to play into Raziq’s hands and appear to be an ally of his under any circumstances.”

The State Department’s diplomats also avoided meeting Raziq. But that was as far as it went. “I don’t recall there was ever a serious push to remove Abdul Raziq,” said Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador at the time. When Crocker later raised the issue with Karzai, the president responded that Raziq was working closely with the U.S. military. “He was basically saying, ‘Look, I’m told that he’s your guy,’” Crocker told me. “Which turned out to be true.”

Allen’s subordinates in Kandahar continued to fight side by side with Raziq and his officers. “The military guys, for the most part, had a different view of him on the ground, working with him day in and day out,” said Martin Schweitzer, who as a brigadier general served as the deputy U.S. commander in Kandahar.

Despite Leahy laws in the United States, which prohibit support to foreign military units credibly accused of human rights violations, Raziq continued to be ferried around in American aircraft, and his advisers ensured that he and his forces had the air support, fuel and ammunition they needed. “If I asked and it was for Raziq, mostly I was going to get it,” said David Webb, who as a colonel advised him on two separate tours in 2012 and 2017. Upon Webb’s arrival, he was given his orders in no uncertain terms by his superior, a two-star general. “He put his finger in my chest and said: ‘Don’t let Raziq die. That’s your mission,’” said Webb, whose predecessor was wounded while fighting off an attack on Raziq’s headquarters.

Both Webb and Schweitzer stressed that they never saw evidence of Raziq committing war crimes under their watch. “I was with him almost every single day from morning until night,” Webb told me. “I never saw anything bad.”

As an outsider, I often wondered how American officers, bound to uphold the laws of war, rationalized working with Raziq. His tactics in Kandahar — every mutilated corpse or disappeared person — were intended to send a message, to terrorize his enemies and those who might support them. And they were effective. When I visited Kandahar in those years, I found that most people on the streets knew exactly what was happening, even if they were too afraid to speak about it openly.

But Raziq also calibrated his actions so that they were deniable. According to former colleagues, he and his men took steps to conceal them from their American allies, like dumping corpses when dust storms obscured aerial surveillance or using veiled language over the phone. Sending someone to “Dubai” meant killing them in the desert. “His commanders would call and say: ‘We caught someone. What should we do?’ He’d say, ‘God forgive them.’ That was his code,” said a senior republican police general who worked with Raziq. “I heard it with my own ears on an operation.”

The farther you got from the streets and villages, the easier it was to ignore what was happening there. According to an interpreter who spent years translating Raziq’s meetings with his American advisers, the subject was generally avoided at headquarters. “The advisers didn’t care about Raziq’s bad activities,” he said. “We weren’t telling Raziq: ‘Hey, do you have private prisons? Do you still have people in there?’”

“I’m not saying they didn’t occur; I’m not saying they did occur,” Schweitzer said about the kinds of accusations that led Allen to halt detainee transfers. “I just know I read all the intel reports.” And whatever American officers chose to believe, they could see that Raziq was delivering where it counted: Within a year and half of his taking over, enemy-initiated attacks were down by almost two-thirds in Kandahar. “I thought he was an incredibly important figure,” Schweitzer said, “and was critical to keeping the security in the south.”

The COIN strategy was tested in the summer of 2014, when the Taliban began a bold offensive targeting the two southern provinces that had been the focus of American efforts. The surge had come to an end, and republican forces were supposed to take the lead in combat.

In Helmand, where the Marines tried to keep out abusive strongmen, the government’s defense was disastrously weak and uncoordinated. In many rural areas, the republican army stayed in their forts and allowed the police to be overrun. Despite the presence of a major American air base in the province, large sections of the northern districts fell into insurgent hands.

But when the Taliban pushed into western Kandahar, Raziq took charge and rallied republican forces. Backed by his advisers and American airstrikes, he inflicted heavy casualties. The following summer, insurgents again attacked and reached the outskirts of Helmand’s capital; Raziq led counteroffensives to lift sieges there and, the next year, in the neighboring Uruzgan province. “The Taliban have fled the area and escaped,” he boasted to a TV crew while touring the embattled district of Now Zad.

By 2017, Helmand was among the top three provinces most controlled by insurgents, according to U.S. military figures. And while the situation was deteriorating across the country, Kandahar City and its surroundings remained relatively secure under Raziq. Journalists and human rights groups had warned that supporting men like him would backfire and inspire resistance to the government. Yet here he was, holding the line against the Taliban.

A Taliban supporter whose husband was killed in battle. She used to aid the movement by smuggling weapons. “We tied pistols around our waists to get them through checkpoints,” she said.

Retired Special Forces Colonel Jamie Hayes was an advisor to General Abdul Raziq early in his rise to becoming one of the most powerful figures in southern Afghanistan.

Raziq was far from the only example: Again and again, the U.S. military felt compelled to partner with Afghan allies who were accused of human rights abuses, despite its doctrine of winning the war by winning hearts and minds. Call it the COIN paradox; for years it puzzled me, until I came across the work of the political scientist Stathis Kalyvas, who offered a convincing explanation of its logic.

In his comparative study of conflicts ranging from the Napoleonic occupation of Spain to the Tamil Tigers’ insurgency in Sri Lanka, Kalyvas asks why civil wars are so often marked by violence against civilians. Discarding explanations like cultural backwardness or ideology, Kalyvas argues that the incentive for this violence is created by the military characteristics of civil war, where the population is the battlefield.

To understand how Kalyvas’s theory applies to Afghanistan, you had to look at the rural areas where most of the fighting took place. Consider the Taliban’s stronghold in Kandahar, the Panjwai valley. A verdant delta of pomegranate and grape orchards west of the provincial capital, Panjwai was the birthplace of the movement. Mullah Muhammad Omar, the Taliban’s leader, preached in his mosque there.

The site of major offensives by allied forces since 2006, Panjwai was arguably the longest and most grueling fight anywhere in Kandahar. During the surge, American troops fought their way in and, by the end of 2010, had built up a string of bases and strong points, many jointly manned with the republican army and the police. The Taliban ordered its fighters to melt back into the villages, where, aided by the area’s dense vegetation and mud-walled orchards, they switched to hit-and-run ambushes, assassinations and improvised explosive devices.

This kind of guerrilla struggle was an example of what Kalyvas calls irregular warfare, in which territorial control is fragmented and mixed between both sides. The Taliban hid their weapons and picked up shovels, taking advantage of American rules of engagement, which allowed soldiers to fire only on those who were armed or posing an active threat. “We basically did not see a difference between the locals and the Taliban,” said Curtis Grace, who patrolled there as an infantryman in 2012.

The Army’s COIN manual stresses the difficulty in irregular warfare of telling civilians and insurgents apart. Kalyvas’s argument is different: The distinction itself can blur. In a conflict with no clear front lines, violence is jointly produced by combatants and civilians, who have the information the troops need to fight their enemies: the location of I.E.D.s and army patrols, the identities of insurgents and government supporters. Moreover, because civil war involves rival state-building, civilians help or hinder combatants by providing logistical and political support. In Panjwai, the Taliban needed local help to operate: They tried to win it by announcing safe routes through minefields, but they were also ruthless with those suspected of being spies and government supporters.

In civil war, while indiscriminate violence, like collateral damage from airstrikes, can backfire, “selective” violence against individuals works in a straightforward way: Do this, or I’ll kill you . Winning hearts and minds can still matter, but it’s only half the story. And in wartime, sticks are often much cheaper and more effective than carrots. In this life-or-death struggle, the competitor willing to use both will have the advantage.

Kalyvas’s work is part of a larger body of scholarship on civil war and counterinsurgency that demonstrates how central the use of coercive violence against civilians has been in such conflicts, whether waged by dictatorships like Syria or democracies like France. “ ‘The bad guys win’ is not the answer that U.S. forces, policymakers or civilians want to hear about counterinsurgency success, but the historical record is clear,” writes the scholar Jacqueline L. Hazelton. In this light, COIN doctrine can be seen as a form of American exceptionalism: the idea that the United States could fight a civil war differently from anyone else — humanely.

If Kalyvas is right, then what the U.S. military faced in Afghanistan was not so much a paradox as an impossible choice. To take back places like Panjwai, there was a compelling incentive to use unlawful violence against the population, which the U.S. military could not allow itself to do. The solution to this dilemma was a division of labor, where the United States provided firepower and money to allies like Raziq, who did the dirty work.

In 2010, the United States introduced the Afghan Local Police program, or ALP. Drawing on their experience with militias in Vietnam and El Salvador, the Special Forces trained and armed villagers around the country. In the military’s hearts-and-minds framework, they were empowering communities to protect themselves against violent outsiders. But four decades of a multisided conflict meant that fault lines ran through communities, villages and even families. Most areas were tribally mixed; finding militias meant exploiting those divisions just as the Taliban had been doing. It meant arming Afghans against one another in a civil war.

As police chief, Raziq was in charge of the ALP program in Kandahar. Panjwai District was the most resistant; by 2011, its horn, as the western end was known, was the only place that the militias had failed to take root, despite the presence of several Special Forces teams. The next year, Raziq appointed one of his key lieutenants as the district police chief. Panjwai was predominantly Noorzai; Sultan Mohammad was an Achakzai like Raziq, but he was from the district. Such local knowledge, the ability to make rural Afghan society legible to outsiders, was precisely what made militias effective. They could go after the Taliban and their supporters in their own homes. The Taliban had gained sway over the villages by targeting the families of those who collaborated with the republic, and the militias, protected by American and regular government forces, could turn the tables.

Most of Panjwai was too dangerous to visit during the war, but when the republic fell in 2021, I was able to travel there, interviewing dozens of witnesses who described torture and extrajudicial killings carried out by members of the police and the ALP, targeting both active insurgents and sympathizers. In the village of Pashmul, several witnesses told me they saw Sultan Mohammad shoot an unarmed old man, Hajji Badr, whose sons had served in the Taliban. Sultan Mohammad told me he had no involvement in murder or torture, but several other people said they witnessed him personally execute prisoners. “All the people from the area knew,” said Hasti Mohammad, a republican district governor in Panjwai. “It wasn’t something secret.”

I was also shown several videos of police abuse, including one in which a group of men, identified by locals as ALP members in Panjwai, tortured a captive bound hand and foot. They strike him with sticks, twist his testicles with their hands, pour water over his mouth and sodomize him with a stick, all while demanding he confess. “I don’t have anything,” he blubbers, growing incoherent.

This brutality was no impediment to American and republican success. Under Sultan Mohammad, the ALP program was established throughout the district. I.E.D. attacks plummeted, while the proportion of bombs that went off without being discovered dropped by half, which one study attributed to increased cooperation from locals.

The U.S. military was aware of the abuses by police officers and militia members in Panjwai. On multiple occasions, American surveillance captured them committing war crimes. One video showing executions by the police was shown to senior U.S. officials in 2012; Colonel Webb said he asked Raziq to arrest the perpetrators, but police investigators told me that some ordinary militiamen were punished instead. Sultan Mohammad was eventually promoted to brigadier general and oversaw several districts in the west of the province. When I spoke with him, he showed me a collection of certificates of appreciation from more than a dozen U.S. military units. “The Special Forces helped us a lot,” he said.

Fazli Ahmad, a Taliban fighter, was arrested by the police, who filmed a video of themselves dragging him behind a pickup truck. He said Sultan Mohammad ordered him to be executed, but he was released after his father paid a bribe.

Sultan Mohammad, a former police chief in Panjwai District and one of Raziq’s key lieutenants. He worked closely with the U.S. military to establish a militia program in Panjwai. “The Special Forces helped us a lot,” he said.

Thanks to his success in Kandahar, Raziq became famous. Not since the late northern commander Ahmad Shah Massoud, whom he greatly admired, had any one figure united anti-Taliban sentiment across the country. He was interviewed on national television, and his picture was pasted on street billboards. Songs were dedicated to him:

He’s the servant of security, the servant of our government.

He’s truly the servant of Afghans.

There were many reasons for his popularity. He was young and dynamic, a village boy who never lost the common touch. He was free with his largess, sometimes handing out cash on the street. He spoke fearlessly against Pakistan’s support for the insurgency. For Afghans disenchanted by the corruption and duplicity of their politicians, Raziq seemed authentic.

“There were other politicians who would talk against the Taliban and Pakistan,” said Nader Nadery, a senior fellow at the Wilson Center who as head of the country’s human rights commission had criticized Raziq’s abuses. “With Raziq, people saw it was not just words.” Even Nadery had come to see the trade-off that Raziq represented, as a bulwark against the looming collapse of the republic. “It’s a difficult judgment to make,” he said. “We can lose everything, or we can keep some parts of it.”

Although Raziq publicly denied accusations of human rights abuses, when an Afghan journalist asked him about them in 2017, he offered something close to a justification. “Showing mercy to such people is a betrayal to our nation,” he replied. “When our soldiers are martyred, isn’t that a violation of human rights? When our schools are burned, isn’t that a violation?”

The truth was that many Afghans saw Raziq’s brutality as a positive quality. They wanted a champion who could protect them from the Taliban’s violence. When Raziq went out on the streets, he was mobbed by crowds of well-wishers. “It was like being an adviser to Elvis Presley,” Webb recalled.

As Raziq grew in stature, he was rehabilitated. Western generals and diplomats sought him out on trips to Kandahar. Over the years, Raziq was a constant there, a fixed point around which contradictory policies and goals swirled: counterterrorism, nation-building, COIN and, finally, negotiations with the Taliban. “We needed him more than he needed us,” said John W. Lathrop, who as a brigadier general commanded American forces in Kandahar in 2017. “Keeping Raziq happy was pretty important.”

For the Taliban, Raziq was one of their top targets. By his own count, Raziq had survived at least 25 suicide attacks. Yet he remained committed to the fight. In one of his last interviews, Raziq criticized republican elites who already had one foot out the door with visas and houses overseas. “We shouldn’t hope or plan to seek asylum in America or move to London,” he said. “We were born here, and we’ll die here.”

On Oct. 18, 2018, General Miller, the top U.S. commander, called a meeting at the governor’s compound in Kandahar to discuss the upcoming parliamentary elections. That day, Raziq put on Western-style clothes: a dress shirt and slacks. The young soldier from the borderlands had become a statesman, a role that came less easily to him. He had seemed worn down to people who had met him lately; he was preoccupied with political dramas in Kabul. He had also been sick for days with a bad stomach bug, but he wanted to see Miller, whom he had known since the early days of the war. During the meeting, Raziq appeared flushed and uneasy, but afterward he insisted on walking to the helicopter pad to see off Miller and the other Americans.

A group of police officers arrived, carrying crates of pomegranates, gifts for the Americans. Among them was a bodyguard for the governor, a young man the Taliban had code-named Abu Dujana. He dropped his crate and fired his assault rifle, killing Raziq and the provincial intelligence chief and wounding several others, including an American general, before he was shot dead.

As one part of the country celebrated, the other mourned. The republic had lost its hero.

What does Raziq’s story tell us about why the United States failed in Afghanistan? Although the immediate cause of the republic’s collapse might have been the precipitous U.S. withdrawal in 2021, the real question is why the Afghan government could not stand on its own despite the hundreds of billions of dollars invested over 20 years by America and its allies. How did hundreds of thousands of soldiers and police officers, armed with modern equipment, lose to insurgents who rode their motorcycles in sandals?

Many corrupt and unpopular governments survive insurgencies. And it’s clear that the Taliban’s violence against civilians did not prevent their ultimate success. More than hearts and minds lost to brutality, internal rot and infighting — fed by the West’s profligate spending and inconsistent strategy — explain the republic’s collapse. Criminal behavior by republican officials escalated to the point that it threatened the system itself, bringing about repeated crises like the near collapse of the banking sector. Wage and supply theft were catastrophic to the morale of soldiers and police officers, while nonexistent “ghost soldiers” inflated their ranks. As the Americans pulled back from rural areas, the ALP militias became increasingly predatory, shaking down locals for bribes; their selective violence became indiscriminate, to use Kalyvas’s terms. “That’s how it started,” a senior Panjwai officer explained. “The district chief stole their salaries and said, ‘Go get your meals from the people.’”

When it came to corruption, Raziq played an ambiguous role: What he stole from the system with one hand he gave back with the other. With their control of the border, he and his cronies siphoned huge amounts of government revenue : The shortfall added up to around $55 million per year, according to satellite imagery and customs data analyzed by the researcher David Mansfield.

But Raziq also spent much of what he earned on his network of sources, on bonuses for his men, on bribes to protect himself from rapacious politicians in Kabul. In a corrupt system, money was synonymous with power, and Raziq needed it to fight. Yet while he tried to curb overly predatory commanders, there was a limit to how far he could go to keep order. He was a prisoner of his own methods. Enforced disappearances, torture and executions, the tools that Raziq believed were necessary to defeat the Taliban, had to be kept hidden, often through intimidation and bribery. Impunity for human rights abuses could lead to general lawlessness; in this way, repressive counterinsurgencies had mutated into mafia states in countries like Guatemala. The men that Raziq handpicked to carry out these acts were of necessity criminals. The darkness they worked within allowed corruption to flourish. By contrast, instead of democracy or human rights, the Taliban professed a fundamentalist vision of Islamic law. Their scholars justified killing captives and civilians as necessary and legitimate in the jihad against foreign occupation. Where the republic’s hypocrisy fed its fatal weakness, corruption, the Taliban’s unabashed brutality was consonant with the movement’s strength, its unity.

Today we live in an age of irregular warfare, of asymmetric clashes with militant groups and battles to control populations. A vast majority of conflicts over the past century have been within states, not between them. The comforting myth that brutality is always counterproductive — that war can therefore be humane — obscures how violence functions in such conflicts; it hides how and to whom men like Raziq are useful. In retrospect, this myth, sold to the public as COIN, is part of a larger pattern of dishonesty that runs through America’s longest war, 20 years of wishful thinking and willful ignorance that culminated in tragedy on Aug. 15, 2021, when Raziq’s mortal enemies entered Kabul in triumph.

Read by Peter Ganim

Narration produced by Anna Diamond and Krish Seenivasan

Engineered by Steven Szczesniak

Victor J. Blue is a photographer who has been working in Afghanistan since 2009, when President Barack Obama escalated the war effort. He was there during the fall of Kabul, when the Taliban came back into power in 2021, and has returned three times since then.

Matthieu Aikins is a contributing writer for The New York Times Magazine and a fellow at Type Media Center who, since 2008, has been covering conflicts in Afghanistan and the Middle East, the U.S. military's operations overseas, forced migration and human rights.  More about Matthieu Aikins

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