Risque teachers are about to have a little less fun. Come the new school year, pedagogues will be advised against wearing short skirts, low-cut tops and bright makeup.
The State Duma's committees on education and family issues are working on a "code of school honor" that would not only make school uniforms mandatory for students but also set standards for the appearance of their teachers, Izvestia reported Monday.
The initiators of the code from the ruling United Russia party said that students are unlikely to follow the uniform rules applied to them if educators don't set a good example.
"Teachers allow themselves to dress with unconcealed sexiness, have side jobs at strip clubs in the time free from lessons, and advertise sexual services on the Internet," a member of the Duma's family committee, Yelena Senatorova, told Izvestia. "This is unacceptable," she said.
The code is also expected to have recommendations for proper behavior. No disrespectful comments, rudeness or intemperance from teachers will be permitted.
Some committee members from opposition parties criticized the initiative. Nikolai Razvorotnev, a member of the Communist Party and the Duma's education committee, said that teachers have a sufficient level of education to know how to dress and behave without any official rules.
Others doubted that the code could be enforced in practice and recommended that the government increases teachers' salaries and social benefits as a way to raise their cultural level.
