Short & Sweet Singapore>>

SHOE-IN FOR TROUBLE

While some students bling up their mobiles, others are blanking out that pesky 'white-only' rule for school shoes. Yen Feng uncovers just how.

Schools' standard uniforms leave little room for individual style. So, students are turning to the next best thing - their shoes.

There are any number of ways students can, uh, get creative to side-step the rules.

At Manjusri Secondary, where shoes have to be 100 per cent white, fashionable students (mainly upper secondary and male) get past the rule with some cleverly worn pants.

The key is to hang them low enough to hide the colours that mark their style. It is easy - after all, low-slung pants are all the rage.

Secondary 4 Manjusri student Norwin Chen decided to do just that this year but unfortunately, his pants were not quite long enough to hide his fire-engine red Nike sports shoes.

Said the 16-year-old: "I got away with it for two days, which was veryshiok. But then my teacher finally saw it, and I had to wear white ones the next day.''

Then there is liquid paper.

Two years ago, the correction fluid and chalk were faithful tools for the style-conscious at Methodist Girls' School.

"The school said that shoes had to be 100 per cent white, so students would use liquid paper to colour out even the lines that ran around the shoe perimeter,'' said Sec 4 prefect Michelle Yeo.

But students are chucking their white-out these days.

Even though, officially, shoes still have to completely white, some students are beginning to get away with a bit of blue or pink. "I'd say it's more like 80 per cent nowadays,'' said the 15-year-old student.

But other than colour, the school has other rules that teachers are sticklers for - brand logos must be no larger than a 50-cent coin, and students can expect to be booked for dirty or muddy shoes.

And the most extreme thing students are doing to keep their shoes hip?

They become councillors.

At Montfort Secondary, shoes have to be only 80 per cent white. But that is not stopping some from wanting to set themselves even further apart from the hoi polloi - you know, common people.

The trick is well worth it: Become a school councillor, and you get to wear black shoes.

In any case, the relaxed 80-20 rule leaves plenty of room for students' creativity.

Said Montfort Sec 5 student Mark Lim: "Canvas shoes, sports shoes, even soccer shoes - as long as you've got the 80 per cent, teachers generally leave you alone.''


What are your school rules regarding shoes and socks? Do they make any sense to you? Spill!