In past years Hellgate students have been able to wear what they wish to participate in gym, as long as it followed the dress code.
This year though, a new policy has been put into place.
Students taking a gym class this year have to wear a gray tee shirt with a white Knight’s logo on it and athletic pants and shoes.
This new uniform costs ten dollars, unless the student qualifies for free or reduced lunch. Then the student is not charged.
If you don’t wear the shirt for the day, you get a zero in that class. If you happen to forget your shirt at home, in your car, or somewhere else, they have loaner shirts you can wear.
When teacher Heather Cheney was asked about the benefits of having students wear the new uniforms, she said it would help “promote safety in movement with appropriate attire (and) break down economic ‘status’ with unified attire,” along with promoting equality and inclusion.
In relation to the recent lockdown, Cheney also stated it helped with safety.
Some of Hellgate students’ opinions seem to be less positive though, leaning more toward the thought process that the shirts are unnecessary and actually hinder the way they learn and participate.
“If they expected us to wear the shirts every day to class, they should have given us multiple shirts because hypothetically wearing the same shirt every day is unhygienic. Second, I get really hot when I’m working out, and I feel like to be able to work out effectively, I need to have a choice of clothing,” sophomore McKenna Richter said.
Along with this, Richter thinks “the budget should have gone to improvements to the equipment, materials, and other funding that’s put into PE classes and or other important things the school should have used the budget for.”
The point of the budget is a good one, considering that the school has had to substantially cut back on funding. Spending money on shirts that the students feel do not benefit them while the rest of the school, especially the arts and trades departments, are scraping for basic supplies could be viewed as unnecessary and frivolous.
Sophomore Theodore Hartwick shared his feelings about the new gym attire, expressing the thought that they “don’t really help much”, and his opinion that they could hinder his willingness to participate in certain activities.
Principal Judson Miller stated that the main reason for these shirts was so that when students were off campus, they could easily be identified as a part of the group, and not get mixed up with other teen aged people and Missoulians.
Miller also acknowledged that this transfer into the new policy was not particularly well communicated before the school year started, and he does own up to the fact that it may change students’ desires to participate in a P.E. class this year. However, he said, “Just to be honest I didn’t think it was going to be that big a deal.”
Regardless of his thoughts on the issue, many students feel the opposite.
When putting a new policy into place it is the administrators’ job to properly notify students and parents, as well as consider any positive or negative effects.
It seems that the main goal is to keep all the students safe and ready to participate in a fitness class, whether or not that will be the end result.
Ultimately only time will tell whether this investment pays itself back in terms of effectiveness and cost, or if it will decrease enjoyment of P.E. classes, and hinder students ability to learn effectively.
