By Robyn Grace
Eva Urtone spent all of primary school being told no hat, no play.
When she started year seven, no one told her she had to wear a hat, so she didn’t.
Eva Urtone dons a hat after Matthew Flinders Girls Secondary College implemented a no hat, no play policy for high school students.Credit: Jason South
But from term four, the year nine student will face detention if she doesn’t remember her headwear.
It’s a significant shift at Matthew Flinders Girls Secondary College in Geelong, which is believed to be one of the state’s first public high schools to mandate the wearing of hats.
Acting principal Damien Toussaint said the new policy made hats compulsory for all students when they had sport or PE, on excursions, and during lunchtime and recess on all days with a UV rating of three or above.
It was developed in consultation with students, the school council and Cancer Council Victoria following a review of all school policies last year.
Students have been given two terms to adjust to the new rules, which also extend to staff. From the end of the year, penalties will apply.
Toussaint said the gap in sun-safe education became obvious to him when he began paying attention to the multitude of primary school students still wearing hats as he drove home from school.
He said that entrenched behaviour was proof that when it came to sun safety, “primary schools do it really well and secondary schools are a little lax”.
Younger students who still remembered the no-hat, no-play rule were quick to embrace Matthew Flinders’ new policy, Toussaint said. Older students who had lost the habit were more resistant.
Acting principal Damien Toussaint with students Eva Urtone, Zari Wiseman and Summer Bibby.Credit: Jason South
The Education Department’s sun and UV protection policy states that schools have a duty of care to ensure that all reasonable steps are taken to minimise the risks from exposure to UV.
Schools are advised to support staff and students to use a combination of sun-protection measures – including hats – when UV index levels are three or above.
But unlike primary schools where a strict no-hat, no-play policy is applied from mid-August to the end of April, high schools generally just encourage students to comply.
Toussaint said he would like to see stronger guidance on enforcement from the government, particularly given global warming and the tanning culture prevalent among teens.
“I’m surprised that the sun-smart policy is not one that’s mandated … given the climate crisis and conversations around that and schools trying to be proactive in educating kids and getting them to think about their role in that.”
For Eva and her friends, the policy makes it easier to be sun-smart.
“Honestly, I don’t mind wearing a hat,” she said. “But I think it’s just when we’re at school and no one else is wearing them it’s a bit, ‘why would I wear one if no one else is doing it’?
“I think it’s very much like a peer pressure thing. If everyone else is wearing it, it doesn’t feel uncool.”
Emma Glassenbury, head of the Cancer Council’s SunSmart Victoria, said it was unknown how many high schools had mandated hats but it was just one way to bring about change.
“Schools can introduce a number of measures including providing adequate shade, adopting student uniform or dress codes which include sun-protective clothing, using hats, sunglasses and sunscreen, staff role-modelling personal sun-protection behaviours and engaging directly with students, staff and families to support sun protection strategies and behaviours,” she said.
Parents Victoria chief executive officer Gail McHardy said young people today were more aware of sun-safe behaviour than previous generations but the good work of primary school policies could be lost to peer pressure in high school.
She said schools should involve teens in developing sun-smart policies to give them greater agency.
Colin Axup, president of the Victorian Association of State Secondary Principals, said schools should educate students to be sun-smart but let them make decisions for themselves.
“I think modelling good policy is one thing and is a positive,” he said. “Making it compulsory and having to enforce it does not necessarily make it something that therefore will be continued.”
However, Axup said school councils determined uniforms. If the school community decided it wanted to mandate hat-wearing, schools would have to enforce it.