School uniforms need shared responsibility

A school uniform is the sort of thing adults argue about only when something is wrong: the sleeves are too short, the fabric is too thin, the price seems too high. Few people would put it alongside the bigger questions of education.

Yet in several Chinese cities, a change in how school uniforms are bought is raising a bigger question: What should a school actually be responsible for?

In 2018, schools in Shenzhen, Guangdong province, no longer organized uniform purchases, allowing students and parents to buy school uniforms themselves through shops, supermarkets and online platforms.