I work with a mom of a teenage daughter. The daughter moved from private to public school this year as she's now a freshman. The mom was quite dreadful of losing the school uniform. As she put it to me, she doesn't have much choice but for her to wear some revealing clothing as there isn't much else on the racks in the stores. Now of course her daughter is precisely a size zero which can make some of the choices limiting anyway. Even while attending the private school, on a school trip they were allowed to dress out of uniform but still had guidelines to meet, her daughter could not wear shorts because they couldn't find any in the stores that met the guideline of nothing shorther than her fingertips.

I think my parents were lucky ... the tomboy look was more my thing (I think it was more popular too) - jeans and a tshirt or sweatshirt and I was happy as a lark.