School-uniform policies have become prevalent since the mid-1990s, with almost 20 percent of public schools requiring them as of 2007-08. From Long Beach, CA to Boston, MA, urban districts cite intrinsic benefits of these equitable outfits: They contribute to school order and safety and decrease social stratification. But these benefits are all anecdotal—uniform policies have largely evaded robust quantitative analysis. This National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) paper seeks to fill the gap. NBER analysts parsed data from a large urban school district in the southwest (administrative records from 1993-2006 and test data from 1998-2006 were used). Their findings: At the elementary level, uniforms were positively correlated with teacher retention (attrition went down 5 percent with the adoption of uniform policies). At the secondary level, they showed a slightly positive impact on student attendance (more so for girls than boys, and more so for economically disadvantaged students at high-poverty schools). But on student achievement, disciplinary infractions, and grade retention, uniforms had no discernable effect. Which probably shouldn’t be too surprising; as they always say, it’s what’s on the inside that counts.
Elisabetta Gentile and Scott A. Imberman, Dressed for Success? “The Effect of School Uniforms on Student Achievement and Behavior,” (National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper, August 2011).
