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Casual attire preferred by female school teachers: Study

08 Nov 2022

  • Study finds efficiency, productivity, self satisfaction, safety, and economic benefits as reasons for preference
BY Ruwan Laknath Jayakody The dress code for Sri Lankan female teachers should be changed to include casual attire, which is the most preferred clothing of the majority of Sri Lankan teachers, as it favours the dynamic role of the teacher to enhance their efficiency and productivity, whilst ensuring their self-satisfaction and safety and bringing about economic benefits in terms of saving money and time, a local study on the effect of the dress code on the job-related performance of Lankan female school teachers recommended. This recommendation was made in an article on the “Effect of the dress code of Sri Lankan female school teachers on their job performance”, which was authored by U.G.L.B. Jayasooriya and W.A.D.P. Wanigasundera (both at the Peradeniya University, with the former attached to the University’s Postgraduate Institute of Agriculture), and S. De Silva (at the Saga University, Japan) and published in the Vidyodaya Journal of Management 7(1) in May 2021. According to the Education Ministry’s “Circular number 21/2018: Introduction of an appropriate dress to pregnant school teachers”, there are a total of 241,591 teachers, while the majority of them (73%) are females. The females of Sri Lanka follow global clothing patterns as well as traditional clothing patterns. The saree is one of the commonly used dresses among Sri Lankan females. The saree is worn in different styles – the Indian style which is mainly in the low, peripheral part of the country, and the osari in the upcountry/central part of the country. The difference between the osari and the saree remains not in the garment, but in the style it is worn. The osari is considered to be more of Sri Lankan origin. The saree is a dress worn with a material of 5.5 m that has to be draped around the body with a fall, a jacket, an underskirt and a few safety pins ranging from five to 20. The pins are used to keep the pleats neat, and to attach the saree to the jacket and the underskirt. The number of pleats and the pins may vary depending on the person. Jayasooriya, De Silva, and Wanigasundara’s “Dress codes of female employees and their job performance in Sri Lanka” observed that the saree is considered to be the nationally accepted, traditional, and cultural dress for the majority of women in Sri Lanka. It is also a commonly worn and popular official dress for Sri Lankan women in almost all Government organisations as well as in certain private companies. It is also recognised as a formal dress for special occasions. All female Government school teachers in Sri Lanka wear the saree to school, except certain Muslim teachers who wear the abaya, which is considered a dress that conforms to their religion. Almost all female teachers from private schools wear the saree at school. Per the Education Ministry’s “Circular No. 2012/37: Guruwarunge Sadacharathmaka Hasirima Pilibanda Achara Dharma Paddathiya Ha Podu Nithi Malawa”, female school teachers are not obliged by law to wear a saree, as the said circular on female school teachers’ code of conduct and common law recommends a dress that is decent and conforms culturally (the descriptors mention decent, well-disciplined, culturally conforming, clean, simple, and properly arranged) at the workplace. Hence, wearing the saree to schools is more like a social norm.  Sri Lankan students have 13 years of compulsory education where the students have to be in the primary classes for five years, secondary classes for six years, and General Certificate of Education Advanced Level (GCE A/L) classes for two years. Schools in Sri Lanka start at 7.30 a.m. and finish at 1.30 p.m. The duration of a period is 40-45 minutes above the primary level, and 30 minutes for the primary level. There are nearly eight periods per day; four or five periods before the lunch break and three periods after the lunch break. The lunch break lasts 15 minutes. Both teachers and students have no breaks or recess in between the periods or after the lunch break. Students may have after-school activities; sports activities and activities of different societies and associations which are not made compulsory while sports activities can however be compulsory depending on the school.  Teachers stay after school as teachers-in-charge of such extra-curricular activities, but not all the teachers are engaged in such. Teachers also conduct after-school classes for students whose examinations are to be held soon. This duty assigned to teachers may or may not be compulsory, as this is left to the discretion of the schools. Teachers are not necessarily supposed to attend schools during the vacation unless there are some pre-decided arrangements and duties. Teachers’ efficiency, effectiveness and satisfaction at work are important and those can directly or indirectly affect students. The dress that teachers wear at school can affect non-verbal behaviour and communication (L.B. Rosenfeld and T.G. Plax’s “Clothing as communication”, E.C. Sampson’s “Teachers’ perceptions of the effect of their attire on middle school students’ behaviour and learning” and S.M. Hughes’ “The effect of casual dress on performance in the workplace”), approachability and familiarity (M.L. Slepian’s “The cognitive consequences of formal clothing”, A. Furnham, P.S. Chan, and E. Wilson’s “What to wear? The influence of attire on the perceived professionalism of dentists and lawyers”), the morale and quality at work (M.A. Sharkey’s “A study to determine how casual dress in the workplace affects employee morale and productivity”), satisfaction (W. McPherson’s “‘Dressing down’ in the business communication curriculum”), productivity and effectiveness at work (M. Kaser, L.W. Bugle, and E. Jackson’s “Dress code debate” and T. Gutierrez and R.J. Freese’s “Dress down days: Benefit or burden?”), work quality (Sharkey), comfort (D. Nickson, C. Warhurst, and E. Dutton’s “The importance of attitude and appearance in the service encounter in retail and hospitality”), savings (McPherson and Sharkey), the time taken to get ready (E. Gentile and S.A. Imberman’s “Dressed for success? The effect of the school uniform on student achievement and behaviour”), and vulnerability to risks and accidents (an Indian study, A. Yadav, N. Sharma, M. Kumar and S.K. Gupta’s “A case of ligature strangulation in an agriculture accident with unusual autopsy findings” and V. Gupta, A. Kumar, P. Gupta, S.P. Singh, S.P. Singh, V. Singh, S. Srivastava, S. Verma, R.C. Singh, and M. Singh’s “Pattern of two-wheeler road traffic accidents in a rural setting: A retrospective study”).  Hence, the job performance, effectiveness and the efficiency of the duties that teachers perform are likely to be affected by their dress due to the psychological, sociological, economic, and safety-related implications of the dress.  A dress can be a material thing that affects the appearance of individuals and the actions and reactions among individuals. In the context of Sri Lanka, the cultural value ascribed to the saree as a dress is prevalent and dominant. Since the saree has been a dress that women used to wear from the past and has evolved as the most suitable dress to promote nationalism, the act of wearing the saree symbolises nationalism and cultural conformity. The saree is the ideal and most desired dress to be worn for job interviews in the Sri Lankan context. The saree is a dress related norm for female school teachers in Sri Lanka as the saree tends to symbolise the identity of teachers. Female teachers wearing the saree have become a sign of a school setting in Sri Lanka. According to A.D. Zoysa’s “Gendering the colonised and dressing the decolonised female body”, certain principals of schools want female guardians and mothers of students to wear the saree when visiting the school.
  1. Jayawardena’s “Cultural construction of the ‘Sinhala women’ and women’s lives in post-independence Sri Lanka” claims that it was Buddhist revivalist Anagarika Dharmapala who emphasised the Indian saree as a suitable garment for Sinhala women, as it covered their legs, navel, and midriff. Women wearing the saree are also considered to be a requirement of national movements, as it is said to be a symbol of nationalism. Jayasooriya et al. note that since then and to date, the saree has been given due respect, recognition, and acceptance in the society and has been used as the most common official dress for women working in many Government and private organisations, including schools.


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