The brand new school has been looked at as a fresh start for Pentucket. Rebranding and enforcing school policies has been a massive theme for the new school year. 

The obvious change from Sachems to the Panthers has helped support this sense of refinement. The idea of community and coming together is another main focus. School colors have been seen as a big step towards uniting the school. A school once revolved around green, black and white are now focused strictly on green and white. This means that uniforms now must only contain these colors. The color black is now banned. 

When asked about this issue Senior Michelle Daley, stated that she “thinks it is absurd. It is a color of clothing that we all wear to practice and to school.” She went on to share that she believes “A color of clothing is not a bad thing and should not be seen that way. Colors do not affect the environment of a school.” 

Importance of a Base Color 

Senior Kaileigh Moriarity comments on uniforms without black, “Uniforms can not look good without a base color. Black is used to tie it all together. Green and white are both bold colors and need another color to complete a design that looks good.” Kaileigh offers a perspective on the fashion and design of this debate.  

To match a color scheme and look aesthetically correct, most clothing designs require three colors; a base color and two additional colors. Black is often used as this base color, but now this is extremely frowned upon. New uniforms have seen the consequences of this. A very popular opinion is the dislike of these new uniforms. Does the lack of black have anything to do with this?  Some sports have not seen this effect, while other teams see this as a real issue and struggle. 

Cheerleading Dealing with Lack of Black 

Daley also comments on this, “Cheerleading is the most affected by this. Our sport requires us to look good. Other teams also have black attire, but we were not allowed to get any.” 

The sport focuses on the entertainment of one’s routine. After a long struggle, the team was finally approved to get new uniforms after decades of suffering through the same uniform. A new uniform was made up; filled with hopeful promises for the future of the program. It was shut down because the base color was black. The uniform highlighted the colors green and white, but black was seen as a necessity to ensure a clean and satisfying design. The uniforms were remade and finally, a new uniform was settled on. The team experienced a similar thing when ordering sweatshirts and sweatpants. 

This was not even the biggest issue for the cheerleaders.

Game days are a part of cheerleading that focuses strictly on the idea of looking good. Whether it is the cheers or the cheerleaders themselves, catching the crowd’s attention is vital. Standing in front of a crowd of fans leads to a deeper importance of uniforms. Eyes are focused on them and to create a visually entertaining experience, the uniform must follow this act of perfection. Does a design with only two colors result in appealing uniforms being an impossible task?

Cheerleading coach Julie Frietas gives her input, “I feel like it makes it a little bit harder for teams who are trying to order new uniforms, sweatshirts, and apparel.” 

Since cheerleading uniforms are much more highlighted it is also important that they accurately portray Pentucket. This means having just the school colors to eliminate the idea of the color black in our school’s green and white. But does the use of black have that much of an impact on school spirit?

Other Sports Impact

 Most other sports are not focused on the look of the players and rather on the point of the game. Points are not rewarded to teams for looking better. However, it is commonly stated that if people look good they will play well. Especially for girls’ sports, they want to be able to have a uniform that looks good to feel their best. Although there is no true proven association between the look of a uniform and the result of a game, having bad uniforms still creates a lesser feel within the team.

“Soccer is not really affected by this, but it is just pointless. Black is just a color and there is no need to not use it. So many other schools use black as a base color even when it is not in their school colors,” a senior on the Pentucket soccer team, Caitlin Armao shared. 

As Armao says, the soccer team seems to be minimally affected by this change. They received brand new uniforms this year, but they were ordered before this was strictly enforced. They have black shorts. Here is an example of the necessity of black as a base color in uniforms. The shorts are needed to offer a balance of colors. The uniform highlights green and white, but the black shorts are in this case seen as acceptable.

A common theme is that this is causing more issues than it is worth. Even teams that are not directly affected by this, still face the annoyance of the matter.

Field hockey has also faced very little fallout from this change. They have black warm-up outfits; black sweatshirts paired with black sweatpants. This is rumored to be because they already had these uniforms and eventually will be forced to convert to follow the new black rule. In the following years when new attire is ordered it is expected that black will not be allowed on them. 

The Allowance of Gray 

Senior Courtney Lynch gives her opinion on this: “If the school is so worried about only having two colors, then why is grey allowed in sweatshirts and sweatpants? Why is black banned but gray is fine?” 

Courtney brings up another vital aspect of this debate; the authorization of gray in attire. Warmup uniforms have been incorporated into this concept of green and white. This usually entitles a sweatshirt and sweatpants. Teams were given the option to have gray, instead of black. Gray is not a part of our school color, but why is it allowed when black is not?  

Uniforms are a representation of the school and black is not in our school colors, so it is not authorized in designs of new attire or uniforms. All new uniforms have received almost animus negativity. Is this due to being forced to only use two colors or is it just bad luck within all sport’s designs?