Question

I can not find any articles that I know were researched by the author on school uniforms in public schools. Any suggestions?

Details

I am writing a position paper on school uniforms. I believe that all public schools should require them at all grade levels, but I also need opposing views.

Answered By: Trustee Library
Last Updated: Aug 25, 2020     Views: 453

The best place to start your search for articles on the subject of education is on the Education LibGuide (http://libguides.brenau.edu/content.php?pid=31693&sid=231638).  Click on the "Articles" tab and you will find links to several databases which will be useful for your research.  Academic Search Complete is a very good source of articles covering a wide variety of topics, so that is generally a good place to start.

To address your topic of the merit of school uniforms specifically, you may wish to start by thinking of a few terms and phrases which apply to your subject.  First we know that the term "school uniform" is an obvious choice.  But how would you best apply that to your search?

You may want to start with the Basic Search, simply inputing the term "school uniforms" and selecting "Full Text" and "Scholarly Journals" as limiters.  Doing this you should retrieve around 49 results.  If you would like to target your search further, go to the Advanced Search, retain "Full Text" and "Scholarly Journals" as limiters, and select "SU Subject Terms" from the drop menu located to the right of the text box.  With this option selected, the search engine will only look for subject headings that contain the term "school uniforms."

Two articles I found using these searches are:

GERELUK, D. (2007). What Not To Wear: Dress Codes and Uniform Policies in the Common School. Journal of Philosophy of Education, 41(4), 643-657. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9752.2007.00576.x 

and

Huss, J. A. (2007). THE ROLE OF SCHOOL UNIFORMS IN CREATING AN ACADEMICALLY MOTIVATING CLIMATE: DO UNIFORMS INFLUENCE TEACHER EXPECTATIONS?. Journal of Ethnographic & Qualitative Research, 131-39. Retrieved from EBSCOhost.

When you find an article you believe is pertinent to your paper, look in the subject heading area of the title page that describes the article and contains its abstract.  In the case of this topic you may find helpful phrases like "dress codes."

Also be sure to search more than one database to ensure that you retrieve as much information about your topic as possible.  Research Library and ERIC (at EBSCOhost) are also excellent sources.

You can also call the library at (770) 534-6113 or send an email to library@brenau.edu for additional assistance.  We’re here to help!

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