What Cold Children?

You know you are in Alaska when you see the coat less kids. That's not during the summer time or anything, but in the dead of winter.
I can't figure out if the kids think it's cool, or they just feel hot?
The first time I experienced this phenomena, was many years back when I was stuck behind a school bus. Outside it was 8 degrees fahreinheit. All these middle school kids came off the bus without any coats. Brrr, it was chilly watching them. Next I saw the same type of kids at the grocery store on winter days, sometimes even in shorts! BUT they were middle school kids and driven by strange forces, so who knew how common it was.

But then I noticed that the Mat-Su Valley public school supply list reminds parents to: "Provide your kids with a winter coat!" Interesting reminder, is underware on the list too?
But now I see this issue isn't really about coat reminders or middle school kids. It starts young, whenever a mini-Alaskan is allowed the opportunity to leave the house.

I now have my own offspring on the school playground, and have become familiar with the parental game called ,"where's your coat?" or "Go find your coat". Then we parents spend a good hour searching ditches and bushes for our kids coats. Mind you it's like 20 degrees outside. You don't really care if the children are cold at this point, just annoyed that they keep ditching those nice coats somewhere.

After a few years of living in Alaska, you recognize that children don't fall dead without their coats, so you just accept it. I'm just wondering if this all looks like some kind of crazy child abuse in the Lower 48?