I read with interest last Thursday's report, 'No shorts, no dyed hair, no slippers...', on the dress code crackdown at the Management Development Institute of Singapore (MDIS).

Educational institutions should focus on their main priority, which is education - not fashion policing.

The issue is not about letting students express themselves freely, but rather the idea that they can express themselves freely.

Education is not only about integration and institutionalisation, but also about empowering individuals who can uniquely contribute to the community.

The value in education lies in the cultivation and development of knowledge and of the individual's ability to make informed decisions and to question.

The institution will be doing itself and society a disservice by creating an environment where the idea of free expression is repressed.

I am against the idea of educational institutions producing buttoned-up, subservient individuals who conform only because of the threat of punishment.

Those driven by the desire to learn will not choose a school based on how well it polices the dress code.

Ultimately, educational institutions should not be moulded in the interests of their leaders or administrators, or according to their ideas of aesthetic decency.

As students are the major stakeholders in these institutions, they deserve greater say in the structure and relevance of these rules.

Ho Chi Sam

This article was first published in The Straits Times on 9 Nov, 2008.