MD

Module 5: Language Practice: Addressing the Opposition

Professor G.

ESL 0202 LD05

April 29, 2029

Give us a Dress Code!

Ah, summertime is almost here! It’s time to show up to school dressed for the weather, right? It’s time for tube tops, shorty shorts, and loads of other body-revealing clothes, right? Wrong. PGCC is an institution of learning. It is a place where not only minds are developed, but also morals and common sense. As an institution that guides students to choose a path they may lead for the rest of their lives, PGCC has a right to establish standards for dress as well as behavior. While students may feel that, as Americans, they have a right to their freedom of expression, they do not realize that in a civil society there is a time and a place for beachwear. That place is not PGCC. PGCC, as a guiding institution, should establish and enforce the kind of dress code that students will be required to follow in the professional world where uniforms and other standards of dress are the norm.

Some students claim that a dress code in college isn’t fair because they are adults, and adults should be able to express themselves in any way they want. However, in the professional world, most adults do not have the luxury of expressing themselves without regard to their context. In the professional world, professional attire like modest skirts, slacks, and button-down shirts are expected of competent employees. What is the point in educating a student to prepare him for a job without finishing the task and teaching him how to dress for it? While freedom of expression might apply perfectly in social situations, it isn’t a right that extends to the institution that is trying to shape representatives of the future working world. Sometimes too much personal choice erodes the feeling of high standards among college students.

Opponents of dress codes also argue that other people’s sense of style is not our business. These people have a “live and let live” philosophy about how others dress. Perhaps they have never considered the impact of revealing clothing that can be very distracting in the classroom. Students are challenged to stay focused when there is a student in the room wearing too little, and it’s rather difficult to treat classmates as equals when they are showing parts of their bodies that shouldn’t be shown in an academic setting. By dressing suggestively with very low-cut or midriff-bearing shirts, short shorts or skirts, women may be creating obstacles toward female equality in the classroom.

Speaking of female equality, proponents of wearing anything they want, anywhere they want insist that placing restrictions on style is like moving backwards in time to when our culture was more conservative and intolerant. I argue that restricting tactless outfits on a college campus, while it may have been a feature of the past, isn’t going to bring back the negative restrictions and discrimination of the past. Laws that protect people from segregation, discrimination, and harassment will still exist. There is no slippery slope that begins with modest style and ends with the old-fashioned value system of white-male privilege in the 1950s. Uniformity of dress, in fact, creates a more cohesive and respectful social climate on college campuses by discouraging harassment and competition.

In conclusion, while some people think that a new PGCC dress code would violate personal rights and freedoms, a stricter, more modest dress code could inspire better concentration on the most important task as student has at college: being a good student. College is a not a fashion show, but an institution of learning that strives to make the best people out of its students. PGCC is doing them a disservice by not guiding them in style as well as intellect.

After reading the essay “Dress Code” answer these questions:

1. What problem is the writer addressing? How does the writer introduce this issue?

2. What is the writer’s position on this topic? Highlight the writer’s position in yellow.

3. How is the argument organized?

4. Write three reasons the writer gives to support a dress code (pros) and three reasons against a dress code (cons) in the boxes below.

Pros:	Cons:
1.	1.
2.	2
3.	3

Write the signal words the writer uses in each paragraph to introduce an opposing view and respond to it.

Opposing view	Writer’s response
1. Some students claim that…	1.
2.	2 Perhaps they have not considered…
3.	3.

More Practice: Addressing the Opposition

Opposing view	Writer’s response
· Some people feel that… · Others may believe that … · Others may argue … · Some people might think … · It may be true that … · Opponents may disagree because · Some students claim that…	· However, … · Although many think that …it is clear that… · Some opponents say that … despite the fact that… · While it may be true that…., certainly… · It is undeniable that…, but what they fail to acknowledge is… · Perhaps they have not considered…

Using the signal words to address the opposition, rewrite these statements to include an opposing view.

1. The U.S. should open public schools for face-to-face instruction this fall.

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2. Facemasks should be worn at all times in public.

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3. American civilians should be allowed to own guns.

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4. Police in the U.S. should wear body cameras at all times during their shifts.

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5. The speed limit on all Maryland highways should be changed to 75.

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