I never suffered colds as a child, if I had my hanky would have been kept in my tunic pocket . Tunics/pinafores back in my day were made from woollen worsted - a much smarter material than my daughters' polyester pinafores. At the end of each term my pinafore went to the dry cleaners and in between Mum had to sponge clean any stains.
Mealymoo, all that yellow was to ensure you didn't get run over by the snow plough walking home in winter.
As you all have probably perceived from my posts about my 'family situation' and the school I was at 1956-1959, there wasn't a lot of 'niceties' about the area. What girls wore [or didn't] beneath the skirts soon became obvious with absenteeism. I will not dwell on the matter - but I did have one master there who made an 'impact' on my late teenage life.
I don't know where you went to school, but the only ones in the 50's that had uniforms were the private schools (which in England were called public, I think). Usually affiliated with C of E or catholic. I never, ever wore a uniform other than grade school and the reason our high school didn't was that it was 80% Jewish and there was no way those rich girls were trading their cashmere sweaters for a dumpy uniform, lol. Ron wore a uniform, of course. The schools in Jamaica all were affiliated with a church and all had uniforms. I get a giggle out of seeing old piccies of him in one.
Our school colours were burgundy and cerulean the Headmaster had delusions of grandeur! And grey. Skirts (two inches below the knee) and trousers were grey, blouses were white, cardigans were grey, knickers were grey and were embarrassingly worn by the girls for gym with a tee-shirt of the colour of your house (bog-standard red, yellow, blue or green, but named after famous local people). Ties were in school colours and blazers were burgundy. Boys wore caps and girls wore berets. Black shoes for coming and going to school, and we changed them to brown ones when we were actually at school! In the summer, boys were allowed shorts (grey) and girls had cotton dresses of pale grey and white stripes. Six-form girls had cerulean dresses but made out of some dreadful fabric which was hot and which frayed terribly; I remember Mum cursing whoever had chosen it when she made my sister's dresses. I also remember the injustice of getting into the sixth form where caps and berets were no longer obligatory and losing out because they changed the school rules and removed them for everyone For the girls, absolutely no make-up - even a suspicion of some meant being sent to wash their faces; no jewellery whatsoever - apparently we were lucky to be allowed to wear watches!
