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#1: Rules Author: Sarah_L, Location: Leeds

Posted: Fri Mar 25, 2005 7:23 pm

It's often said in the books that the CS has so few rules it's not a hardship to keep to them. Is that really true however? To me, the girls seem to be highly regulated in everything they do. There's one incident in Barbara where the girls are getting ready, and in one paragraph you come across two rules, one in particular which sounds unnecessary. Barbara isn't allowed to go into Emerence's cubicle to help Emerence tie her collar, and so they have to do it in the middle of the dormy floor. I can understand visiting being banned during the night, but why can't they during the day? It must take a new girl a long time to remember all the rules.

#2: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Fri Mar 25, 2005 10:47 pm

Compared to many school, there aren't that many:

No talking in the corridors
No using the front stairs or door (except the Prefects)
No visiting other girls' cubicles
The correct language of the day must be used
Girls must respond quickly to bells
Manners must be observed (curtseying in the study, standing for masters and mistresses, etc.)

Are there others?

And I think the visiting rule makes sense, as it gives each girl somewhere private and personal from the other girls.

#3: Author: Ann, Location: Newcastle upon Tyne, England

Posted: Fri Mar 25, 2005 11:15 pm

There are all the various 'unwritten' rules on top of the actual rules. They strike me as being far more difficult to adhere to for new girls.

#4: Author: Sarah_L, Location: Leeds

Posted: Sat Mar 26, 2005 5:58 pm

Did anyone have any really unusual or nonsensical rules at their schools? I'm trying to compare the rules at my school to the CS, but I would say we had less.

#5: Author: RroseSelavy, Location: Oxford, UK

Posted: Sat Mar 26, 2005 6:33 pm

I thought the rule stating the exact way of tying one's scarf in Eustacia was a bit much...

Sarah_L wrote:

Did anyone have any really unusual or nonsensical rules at their schools?

We didn't have many odd rules, but we did have a terrifying deputy head who would prowl the corridors and berate anyone whose uniform wasn't perfect - this included wearing socks that had gone slightly grey in the wash as they weren't black enough anymore Shocked

Now I'm older I think he just had a strange sense of humour.

#6: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Sat Mar 26, 2005 11:06 pm

RroseSelavy wrote:

I thought the rule stating the exact way of tying one's scarf in Eustacia was a bit much...

But that was based in the medical belief of the day that the chest must be warmly covered. It also had the benefit of securing the coat so that it didn't blow open and let cold air in.

#7: Author: Sarah_L, Location: Leeds

Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2005 1:44 pm

KB wrote:

It also had the benefit of securing the coat so that it didn't blow open and let cold air in.

But wouldn't buttons do that!

#8: Author: Kim, Location: Tipperary, Ireland

Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2005 7:29 pm

But wouldn't buttons do that!

it was a belt and braces approach! One must remember the times the books covered where illnesses that we wouldn't worry about might have had very serious consequences for the girls.

#9: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Sun Mar 27, 2005 10:25 pm

Sarah_L wrote:

But wouldn't buttons do that!

Not all the time!

*bitter experience*

I've had wind literally so strong that it blew across the front of my coat and forced its way in, popping two buttons.

#10: Author: MissPrint, Location: Edinburgh

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 1:25 am

A stupid rule at my school was the traffic in corridors one. They changed it from in pairs on the left to single file on the right, or vice versa, or some combination thereof, and confused the whole lot of us, leading to unseemly melees in the corrridors and choas on the stairs.

My daughter's school has a one-way system which is sensible for parts of the building, but a blooming nuisance for getting to and from music lessons where she finds herself wandering three sides of a square along deserted corridors just because. Also, it can entail descending to the basement just to come back upstairs further along as the stairs are one way only too.

They also have a six inch rule. As applied to how close members of the opposite sex may be. If it applied to the maximum height of skirt above the knee then the proximity of the sexes might not be such a temptation.

#11: Author: Kathy_S, Location: midwestern US

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 2:11 am

Quote:

Going downstairs she started whistling the Nonesuch air, and was promptly caught by Miss Maynard, and fined. Whistling was forbidden in school, and Jo had simply asked for trouble, as the mistress reminded her in somewhat caustic language.

Never mastered whistling myself Confused

, but why is it so dreadful as to be fined? I could see if it were just an extension of talking in the corridors, but no, it's the whistling itself. Unladylike behavior, as in "Whistling girls and crowing hens / always come to some bad ends" ???

*sings along to Sound of Music*
"She waltzes her the way to Mass and whistles on the stairs..."

#12: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 2:14 am

Perhaps it is similar to the 'no talking in the corridors' - if you allow one, you have to allow everyone and that noise would be phenomenal!

#13: Author: claire, Location: South Wales

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 8:55 am

MissPrint wrote:

A stupid rule at my school was the traffic in corridors one. .

As long as they don't change it, it does work, we had it at our old school and it worked fine. Including up and down stairs where only staff and sixth formers could use the wrong stairs (although you each had to give up one break or lunch time a week to ensure other people didn't use the wrong ones)

#14: Author: patmac, Location: Yorkshire England

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 9:14 am

We had length of skirts as a rule. Two inches below the knee. We routinely had to let down hems when we had a growing spurt, with a very unpretty striped effect as a result.

We wore gym slips for gym and games and they had to be knee length. We knelt in a row and they had to touch the ground.

We also had to wear our hats and gloves out of school and NO eating in the street! There were one or two old girls locally who would police this which was highly resented - shades of OOAOML!

#15: Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 4:18 pm

But Jo isn't allowed to whistle when she's outside the building either - doesn't she start and then break it off saying to Joyce Linton that it's hard to remember she's not supposed to?

I think whistling was considered to be unladylike. Grizel wasn't allowed to whistle at home either.

Liz

#16: Author: Catriona, Location: South Yorkshire

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 7:45 pm

We had girls' stairs and boys' stairs when I was at at school - very sexist! One things that's always struck me is how regimented their daily routines are - they never seem to have much time just to relax or be on their own - they always seem to have to be doing something or be with someone else. As someone who dearly likes her own space, I would have found this difficult.

#17: Author: pim, Location: the Derbyshire wilderness

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 7:50 pm

We weren't allowed to use the front door at my school, only the staff. Fortunately there was nothing near the front door that it wasn't quicker to get to by the bottom doors... didn't stop us trying though Wink

#18: Author: Lulie, Location: Middlesbrough

Posted: Mon Mar 28, 2005 8:34 pm

We weren't allowed to use the front doors either, still aren't, though they are now manned and with a special security button-thing.

A really stupid rule that was brought in at my school was the banning of cardigans for girls. The reasoning was that the cardi would fall around the girl's breasts and accentuate them, thus distracting the boys from their lessons ROFL

The teacher that brought that rule in was the Deputy Head and we all knew what a disgusting pervert he was!!!!

As an aside, I wear cardis to work and they don't fall around my bosom any more than they did when I was 14 and had nothing!! I reiterate my remark about the deputy head.

#19: Author: Vikki, Location: Sitting on an iceberg, freezing to death!!!

Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2005 3:05 pm

We weren't allowed to use the front doors either, except for the 6th form (and teachers obviously) (mind you, I became expert at slipping in the back way even in 6th form because I was always late, and arrived during assembley, and the hall overlooked the front entrance....... Embarassed

)

#20: Author: Lisa_T, Location: Belfast

Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2005 5:43 pm

In the girls boarding house we weren't allowed to use the front staircase- it was a late Victorian/ Edwardian manor house and the stairs were rather grand. We had to use the back (stone) stairs. I remember thinking how CS it was, and also being chuffed when, as a Fifth Form Monitor, I was allowed to use them. To this day, I still get a thrill that I can actually use those stairs....

#21: Author: Kat, Location: Swansea

Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2005 7:50 pm

Our school was yet another which didn't allow you to use the main door. But then again, it was much easier for me to slip across the road opposite mine, and straight past the gyms to my formroom Twisted Evil

Took much longer to go the front way via the arches!!

You were only allowed to use the main door if you were sixthform or staff. The only other exception was if you were late when you had to go to reception to get signed in.

Other rules were general uniform ones (although they only got really strict on formal occasions, with the exception of my formtutor! She was lovely, just very pedantic over uniforms Sad

), walking on the left side only of the corridors, using the correct canteen (we had seperate ones for juniors and seniors, until the junior ones were sold off to form a new welsh school!), no swearing etc.

Our uniform was alraight actually - until 6th form it was grey/black skirt or trousers, with either a white polo neck (always with school bade) or plain white or blue shirt with the school tie. The tie was dark blue with gold stripes and the school badge.
Or jumper was maroon and could be warn with either the polo or the shirt.

Sixthform uniform was same trousers/skirt, but the polo shirt had a different badge, and the tie was all dark blue apart from the School badge at the bottom with 'Sixth form' written on it. Our jumpers changed to dark blue and the school badge and 'sixth form'.

Was actually very comfy!

#22: Author: Laura, Location: London (ish)

Posted: Tue Mar 29, 2005 10:21 pm

At my old school a rule was that any hair ties must be green or yellow... if they weren't you got a lunch time detention! Seemed a liiiittle extreme...

#23: Author: jennifer, Location: Sunny California

Posted: Wed Mar 30, 2005 7:46 pm

I seem to have had a very different school experience...

In elementary (up to about age 12), we weren't allowed to enter by the main doors. The door you entered depended on which classroom you were in, and you didn't go in until after the first bell rang. You couldn't stay in the classroom over lunch unless the weather was *really* foul. In high school, I remember when they changed the rules to allow you to stay in the hallways during lunch break in bad weather, so no more huddling outside in the rain waiting to come back in.

No dress codes, but they'd take exception to shirts with rude words, or extremely revealing outfits. Some schools now have rules by which you have to cover the navel/buttocks/breasts while at school.

The playground was divided into primary and secondary areas (kindergarten - grade 3 and grade 4 - grade 7), and when it snowed the upper field was for snow forts, and sledding, and the lower field was a free for all snowfight area - enter at your own risk.

And of course, no smoking on school grounds.

#24: Author: claire, Location: South Wales

Posted: Wed Mar 30, 2005 9:09 pm

I remember at one junior school the babies (ie the infants, including my brother) had a seperate (ish) playground that the older ones weren't meant to go into. If you had a sibling you could go and see them, there was a low wall with a space to walk through (but no gate) seperating them (that was the school where the head's granmother had been on the Titanic (as a baby, so couldn't really remember it but still history was REAL then) an she lived next door and we used to go see her at breaks and lunches)
At my daughters school the under 5's have a fenced off area of the playground, the others don't have seperate areas but seem to stick to their own (the school has three buildings in a row, seperated mainly by age and they play around their own building)

#25: Author: Kitty,

Posted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 7:36 am

If it hasn't been mentioned already, what about slang being banned?

Does anyone else remember the "6 items only on the dresser" rule from the Naughtiest Girl series? Rolling Eyes

#26: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Wed Apr 27, 2005 9:03 am

I remember the 6 items on the dresser rule!

We weren't allowed to use the staircase nearest the staff room. & in the first year we had a "coat inspection" when our form teacher came down to our lockers and told most of us that our coats were unsuitable, but it was a waste of time because no-one's parents were going to pay for new coats. & we were only supposed to wear the horrible school scarf but we all wore football scarves anyway. & 1st and 2nd years were given priority in the school dinner queue - never quite understood the reasoning behind that!

#27: Author: Dreaming Marianne as gues,

Posted: Tue May 03, 2005 8:21 am

Love yours MissPrint!

At my primary school (independent London one, mainly consisted of Middle Eastern children of embassy staff and British ex-expats (pats I suppose) we had to:

- Curtsy to our teacher at the beginning and the end of the day, also when shaking hands, eg when leaving school at the end of the day. Boys (accepted only til age eight) had to bow. Friends and SLC find this absolutely hysterical

At my secondary school we:

- got sent to the chapel for "time-out"
- even elastic hair bands had to be black, red or white (school colours)
- any coats apart form full length duffel ones absolute no-no
- Latin sung during Eucharist
- No eating in the street (this has clung on, still can't!)

The latter was actually the local C of E comp - albeit an abolsutely excellent one. I only left in 1997 and looking back on it I was so very lucky to have gone there - discipline and pastoral care was second to none - I can't imagine any of us speaking back as I have seen done.

#28: Author: Joyful, Location: Manchester

Posted: Tue May 03, 2005 11:35 am

MissPrint wrote:

They also have a six inch rule. As applied to how close members of the opposite sex may be.

We had that too! Except that the boy's school was a separate school (same grounds) and the only place you might meet them was on the drive at lunchtimes. I always wondered what happened to those who had a brother they needed to give something to...would they expect you to resort to a put it down leaving said brother to pick it up once you had retreated to a safe distance?!

Also had the no-one entering by the main door rule, although similarly it wasn't very useful to us anyway! Is it because the door would be used by visitors and they don't think the pupils could be trusted to behave well enough in front of them? Or just worried about mud from hockey boots etc?

No eating outside school...in fact anywhere in school uniform that wasn't the canteen, because there was no eating anywhere else in school either! Happily we had the wooden lift up desks so there was much hiding of illicit food stuffs and eating with desk lid up... Rolling Eyes

Uniform rules too numerous to mention... exact uniform from the right shops, skirt length, coat length/material/type, shoe heel height, hair band colour, type of bag and how it should be carried... ZZZZ

#29: Author: Shander, Location: Canada

Posted: Wed May 04, 2005 1:09 am

This is certainly making my high school look lax in discipline. No uniform, no real dress code (although nothing overtley rude was allowed). A lot of teacher's let us eat or have coffee in class, and one particular teacher would give us ten minutes at the begining of class to go and get something if she though we looked particularly sleepy. We also had an occasional tendency towards smart-ass remarks. There was a very friendly banter that went on, especially in the higher grades.
The only rule I can remember is that we weren't allowed to eat in the hallways on any floor but the first one, as they were trying to control the mouse population.
Excellent academically, but very relaxed

#30: Author: Rosie, Location: Huntingdonshire/Bangor

Posted: Wed May 04, 2005 1:20 pm

That actually sounds a lot like my sixth form (still at school), although we did still have a uniform. The Head was dead keen on making the sixth feel 'special'! Plus we had very small classes (my French contained 4 of us!) and it was all very friendly!
Two of my lecturers this year have said they have enjoyed teaching our classes as we are fun... and aren't at all shy!

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