Professional dress is some­thing most of us have donned at least once in our col­lege career, and I can only imag­ine how muti­nous you must feel at the prospect.

To make mat­ters worse, pro­fes­sional dress is hor­ri­ble for sum­mer weather. A full suit gets hot very fast and some minor busi­nesses do not have air con­di­tion­ing, not to men­tion Michigan, as many of us have expe­ri­enced, can get very hot in the summer.

Professional dress is not so bad for me; I can don a skirt and a light blouse and stay cooler than many of my male col­leagues. But even with an air-conditioned build­ing, going from a cool/cold to a hot envi­ron­ment can have ill effects on your body.

In the sum­mer of 2011, I worked in the Timme Center on cam­pus which has very cool air con­di­tion­ing. It was extremely hot that sum­mer and I lived in Travis Hall with no air con­di­tion­ing. Let’s face it, fans can only do so much.

I was sick off and on all sum­mer because of the heat. Going back and forth from a cool/cold to hot envi­ron­ment did not help. I was wear­ing a t-shirt and slacks dur­ing work­ing hours; it was not like I was wear­ing a full suit with long sleeves.

Why do we insist that peo­ple wear cloth­ing that is inap­pro­pri­ate for the cli­mate we live in? I am all for look­ing and dress­ing pro­fes­sion­ally, but not at the expense of our health. But until the day comes when our cul­ture regains our san­ity, we should all take care to stay cool in the sum­mer months.

Wear lighter cloth­ing, light col­ors, skirts and put your hair up, but most impor­tantly read up on the symp­toms of heat stroke.

Remember, the heat does not give you an auto­matic excuse to wear shorts and san­dals to the office, but you can wear appro­pri­ate cloth­ing that weath­ers the heat well.

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