The girls’ P.E. uniforms at La Jolla High School have drawn criticism from a number of female students.

While LJHS does not provide large uniforms, it does offer small and medium alternatives. This implies that a girl must buy a men’s medium if she wants to buy a large uniform. Not only is this impracticable, but knowing that they must order a boys’ uniform in order to get their size has an impact on the mental health of girls.

Francesca Divona, a 9th grader at LJHS, expressed reservations about the uniforms: “The fact that there isn’t a size large is crazy. Students shouldn’t have to feel invalid because of that”.

Many young girls already battle with body image, so it doesn’t help that their school doesn’t cater to them. Its extreme practicality is another issue. Instead of needing to travel to guys’ uniforms to receive their size, all girls should be able to order uniforms from the same location.

Bella Duarte, a ninth-grader at LJHS, asserted: “It doesn’t make sense. There should be sizes for everyone, not just some students.” It would be much simpler for students if they could get uniforms from one place and not have to go through the process of trying to find a boy’s uniform that will fit them properly.

For a variety of reasons, La Jolla High School ought to provide a large in girl’s uniform. The fact that this exacerbates girls’ body image concerns and makes it more difficult for kids to locate a uniform that fits them are a couple of the reasons behind this. Large uniforms must be made available at LJHS to simplify life for students.

Article Update and Rebuttal by Coach Jennings:

This article was written by a current student in PE at LJHS with several student quotes about the current situation with Girls specific uniform availability. I am writing this in response to some areas that were falsely written and with zero fact-checking. First, uniforms are offered to all students and kept in the same location. The Girl’s Locker Room was recently remodeled and designed with several storage lockers where ALL the PE uniforms are kept. The PE teachers separated and labeled all the different offerings of shirts and shorts. Items available are Women’s Shirts sizes small and medium, Ladies shorts sizes small and medium, Adult aka Uni-sex shirts sizes small, medium, large, x-large, and xx-large, Adult aka Uni-sex shorts sizes, small, medium, large, and x-large. Upon inspection of shirts when ordering items for the start of each school year, it was made clear that a women’s large shirt was exactly the same size and cut as an Adult, aka Uni-sex shirt size Medium. To be clear, there are NO men’s specific shirts or shorts. They are Adult, aka Uni-Sex. Check the labels…nothing is labeled Men’s or Boy’s. Secondly, access to PE clothes is probably more troubling for the guys on campus than the girls. Girls don’t have to travel anywhere other than their own locker room to get what they need for PE. They don’t have to speak to the Men’s PE teacher to ask for what they thought was a “boy’s uniform”; they can easily speak to one of the two female PE teachers located in the office attached to the girls locker room. At no time is there any “travel to guys uniform to receive their size”. All the girls ARE able to order uniforms from the same location. Unless you are referring to the fact that you have to pay for such uniforms at the finance office, then that is a different issue. Pick-up of uniforms is in the same location, i.e., Girls Locker Room. When ordering the uniforms, at no time are there any labels put on the purchase. It is simply a shirt for $13 and/or shorts for $12. During the first week of school, students are brought into the girls’ locker room to collect their purchased uniforms. They are asked what size they want and given what they choose. In regards to body image, every effort has been made to give the girls at LJHS the opportunity to be comfortable during PE. They have simply been asked to wear “Athletic Appropriate Attire”. This can be found in the PE Syllabus given out during the first week of school and posted in the Canvas PE course. We asked that the PE clothes be black bottoms and red tops to match the uniforms that have been made available by LJHS. The students have been allowed to wear what they feel is comfortable for their body and their image. For example, yoga pants, sweat pants, sweatshirts, Lulu lemon shorts, tights, track pants, and any and all La Jolla spirit wear. The request for girls specific large uniforms was stated at the end of the article in order to “simplify life for students”. If that was all it would take to get students to abide by the uniform policy at LJSH, then we, the PE teachers at LJHS, will make sure you have Women’s size Large uniforms available in the same location at the start of School next year.