As a mother of several girls, the same thought enters my mind every summer: How I miss the uniforms.
There is so much money and effort that must be spent to ensure our girls—both campers and staff—have a complete summer wardrobe, from hair accessories down to the socks. Aside from the financial stress, there’s also the emotional stress of competition and comparison. When I drop off my daughters at camp in the morning, it’s clear how some are very well dressed with all new, up-to-date items, while others are quite the opposite.
The one time this contrast isn’t as noticeable is on the days when the girls are required to wear their camp T-shirts.
Even though they still wear different skirts, socks, shoes, etc., the matching shirts somehow make every girl look presentable and feel just equal enough among her peers.
What I’m recommending as a change for next summer, iy”H, is that camps should allow parents to order and pay (at cost price) for as many camp T-shirts as they would like for their daughters—with the requirement that the shirts be worn daily. Perhaps different color options could be offered as well.
There’s no doubt that this simple change would help reduce the pressure and allow our girls to truly shine in camp.
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It amuses me how lakewood voted in large numbers for Trump but then they write letter like these which sound communist and like something I would expect to hear from NY mayoral candidate Zoran Mamdani.
Not everything has to be exactly equal in life. We should not be teaching our kids that when someone else can afford something that we cannot, we should try to make takanos to take it away from them.
As usual, the problem is that we are looking too much at what others have. If we don’t teach our kids NOW that the world isn’t always fair, they will have to learn the hard way later when it is about more than just what to wear to camp.
I’m going to have to respectfully disagree. I can barely scrape a penny by to buy my children clothing so I shop second hand clothes to save money. Yet, even with no money to pay basic bills, let alone clothing bills, I feel that children will shine the most if they can be individuals and not forced to be exactly like everyone else all the time. My daughter has gotten beautiful second hand clothes from Serendipity for cheap. Actually, her whole wardrobe is from there (pretty much mine too). Please don’t feel jealous if someone has current season clothes and you buy second hand clothes or new past season clothes. You are who you are on the inside. The outside clothing just clothes your body. Most people are too busy with their personal lives to actually care about your external clothes. They will faster assess you on your middos and values.
So true! Finally someone says it! What do they think this?? A kibbutz? Nonsense. The only way to raise our children right is through harsh competition. It needs to be ingrained from an early age that some kids just ARE better. Some people ARE just better.
As someone who makes sure her kids are dressed perfectly, I love this idea! Would relieve so much pressure for everyone!
On this topic, it sounds like you may be a perfectionist and it’s becoming too much for you to handle. To change the standards of others to be a certain way to relieve your pressure isn’t fair. You need to learn how handle your insecurities.
If it’s a pressure for you then you do not have to do it.
As heard from someone who designs tablescapes and other creative ideas in a popular magazine:
Someone told her that she’s causing too much pressure. She responded, “These articles are meant for people who enjoy it. Some people are creative and need an outlet. It’s not meant to be a pressure! If you don’t enjoy it, then you don’t have to do it!”
Hearing this really changed my perspective on external pressures. We think we have to do everything that other people do. Hashem created people with different interests and talents and that’s how the world is able to function. We don’t have to do things that cause us unnecessary pressure.
I don’t agree. Let’s teach our children that it’s ok not to have everything that everyone else has. There will always be people that have more than them. If children are always taught that they need everything everyone else needs. What happens when they grow into adults and their friends have more than them?
This is where you can start teaching yourself and your children not to be jealous and not to look at other people. Try it! It’s life changing!
I’m a mother of many girls. Most are married. There needs to be individuality you can’t always say the girls have to wear uniforms. Btw you can see the difference by the boys as well. Most boys cldnt care less but some do. We can’t always make everyone equal. That’s not real life. If there’s always a uniform when will a girl learn to shop for tznius clothes ???? There’s chinuch in clothing shopping did you realize that? Like the other writer wrote there are ways to get nice clothes for less. My married daughters shop end of season for the next season and get the clothing for really cheap or they shop the stores sales dept the next season. Please don’t get the camps to institute uniforms!!
And while you are teaching your children not to be jealous maybe, if they are the ones with “better” clothes to be gracious and not boasting or flaunt their abundance.
I’m surprised that no one agrees with the writer of this article. My mother, a former teacher, always thought our schools should have uniforms and I’m not opposed to it either. For the exact reason we’re discussing. I didn’t have the name brand clothes growing up myself and I definitely remember that.Young children don’t have to learn all the hard life lessons during elementary school years. Also, plenty of the schools in big cities have uniforms and in large groups it’s obvious when one has gone astray. I’m not against kids wanting to express themselves or their individuality through clothes ect., but when you weigh out the pros and cons uniforms win. Especially for Mom.
We all have uniforms for school.
The writer wants summer day camps to require kids to wear the cheap camp t-shirt so her kids won’t feel deprived of stylish clothing.
Even practically this would never work. Most kids have different camps for first and second half, especially once they are in older elementary age. Do you think every parent wants to buy two sets of camp tshirts plus extra clothing for Sundays, Chol Hamoed, etc? And it won’t help anyway – there’s always skirts, shoes, hair, bags, etc etc.
PLEASE STOOPPP … This isn’t communism. If you want to make your life easier, you can buy 5 of the same tee shirts. Top making everyone else change for your convenience.
We need to stop looking at what other people have and be happy and grateful with what we have. It starts with you and will trickle down to your kids. Theres no need for socialism here. Just work on your ayin tova. The writer points out how she looks and sees what this kid wears and that kid. No wonder your kids are needy and jealous. Youre sending those message out to them! Again, ayin tova! Work on it and life will change for you and your fam.
Stop this garbage. Lazy moms! LIVE WITHIN YOUR MEANS!!! No your daughters don’t need everything new from the local stores. This crazy style trend is out of control. Let your children have their own taste not what the stores tell u is ur taste this season with a 3 digit price tag! Shop Marshall’s tjmax kohl’s malls… yes it’s more time but it build ur child confidence & character. She not wearing what everyone else is it’s individuality. Noone knows the tag price. When she gets a compliment it’ll mean something to her. Kids need a time in life to let out be carefree. Just a huge side note…
THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH WEARING HAND ME DOWNS in good condition. This need to have brand new every season is not within the jewish standard or thetorah way of life.
-Your less frum neighbor
Agree, but I would sign off your more frum neighbor. What’s this business of everyone’s personal gripes needing a letter on the scoop. Grow yourself some self esteem and your children will benefit.
The term Frum refers to a koach/power with a person that is a religious power; in modern hebrew the trm would be Datiutt.
So the Koach nefesh of Frum is very important; where this Koach nefesh can become problamatic is when a person is not just Frum but FarFrummt which is a Yiddish toerm for being overly Frum.
Being overly Frum or Farfrummt means to usetthe Koach nefsh of frum without Sechel.
Using the power of Frum without sechel is what leads to very bad acts but Using the Koach nefesh of Frum with sechel and balance is how we must live as Jews.
People are saying ‘to teach your children Not to be Jealous.’
We also need to teach our children that it is ok to feal jealous but then learn how to not live out that feeling and deal with it by being happy for others that have it better than you.
Children today need to learn how it’s ok to feel but that there is a big distance between feeling and acting out!
Only teaching to look away has the connotation, to me, that really there is no way for me to handle seeing someone better than me so I MUST look away.
I’m an adult, so I am different than children, but I am able and do tell people straight out I am jealous of you as a way to tell them how happy i am for them and how I noticed they have quality that they may have not noticed.
We cannot always stifle what we feel but yes we should not act out the jealousy.
Once there was a child who stuck out their foot while someone hit a double in baseball game. that is an example of acting out jealousy. The boy tripped and got a cast.
But who knows if that child would have been trained and educated to be at peace with feeling jealous of the great baseball player if he would have done such a wicked act.
I’m going to try to walk the fine line here.
It it’s hard to spend so much money on weekday clothing just for the summer when you spent so much on uniforms for the rest of the year. It feels wasteful and cost as much the uniforms but is only used for a few short weeks.
In the other hand, girls are crying out for a way to express their individuality and taking away summer clothing to be replaced with mandatory camp shirts is unlikely to help with that.
So now let’s review the components of your suggestion:
You want camps to allow parents to buy extra shirts. This is a great idea.
You add parenthetically that it should be at cost. This is a bit off target. If the shirts are the wrong size, you would expect a refund. You can’t expect them to take this risk for no profit. I’m not opposed to camps providing shirts at cost, but that is their prerogative.
You then all the camp to make it mandatory to wear the camp shirt every day. This would be counter productive.
Right now the “in kids” wear their camp shirt almost every day as a way to “express their individuality”. If you make it mandatory, you will lose this fondness and make it a “symbol of oppression” and you won’t have the option of sending your daughter to camp in a camp shirt (even if she will go to camp in the camp shirt, she will demand other clothes for after camp).
So in short, I think that you should be able to choose send your daughter to camp in the camp shirt every day, but oppose making it mandatory and I’m ambivalent regarding campus choosing to sell shirts at cost.
As a mother of girls also, I disagree with your request, but I am utterly shocked at the comments here. This was an innocent letter, if you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything, don’t spew out negative comments and are belittling and bashing. There is a way to say things in a nice way. I’m shocked to see the comments and shocked that this platform allows for such things. Yes, this is America, and we have freedom of speech, but we are yiddin, part of am yisroel, and the Torah does not allow freedom of speech.
I can’t disagree enough with the letter writer. Girls need to be taught values and respect for those that can afford more and those that can afford less. They need to learn that they don’t need everything the next one has. individually is so important especially in today’s crazy world. Uniforms are a cop out they don’t teach a girl how to dress properly and gives the schools the options to avoid the topic. uniforms should be abolished and girls will actually learn to dress properly and that proper dress code will be come who they are. I understand clothing cost money but life is not only about money it’s about the beautiful values we want our children to grow up with.
If we wouldn’t have uniforms girls would be taught the day they entered school what is an acceptable dress code as each school would be forced to enforce tznius guidelines. After dressing a certain way for all their childhood by the time they graduate that way of dress with be them and define them. They would never want to dress any other way. Uniforms may have solved some peer pressure but cause much larger problems in the long run. Let’s rethink what’s really important to us.
I grew up out of town and pretty much wear the same style top in different colors and a denim or long black skirt and sneakers everyday. My 12 year old daughter is just as content to dress in cheap amazon clothes and hand me downs from cousins. I cant afford nice things but even if I could I woulnt change my style.. Ive been dressing the same way since high school and Im fine with it. Neither of us feel deprived. She goes to school in the 5 towns and BH has a lot of friends. Its totally a mindset. Its not about jealousy as much as it is being comfortable with your own self image.
Reading this letter and comments, it’s clear to me that the problem is with the “parents” not the kids.
Shout out to camp Campit!! A different colored camp tshirt for every day!! Not mandatory but you get points for your team when you wear your tshirt of the day. Makes mornings so much easier.
Guess what? I’ve been saying this for years. As a mother who has to buy her daughter many many t shirts to go to camp. And t shirts are 40-50.00 each ( teen). I would love to jus t buy a bunch of camp t shirts for in a few colors and send her up with those. Because it would save me a ton of money and headache. Not cuz of uniformity/ keeping everyone the same. I actually suggested this to a camp director and she said if she instituted that she would lose all her customers. Not sure why. I would be so happy.