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Since September 2004, the law allows pupils to wear inconspicuous religious symbols, and prohibits conspicuous religious symbols within the French public primary and secondary school system. How agents working inside the school system are then distinguishing between conspicuous or inconspicuous, the allowed from the forbidden, in their daily enforcement of the law. The aim of this article is to identify the criteria created and mobilised by these agents to evaluate the pupils’ dress codes and the pupils’ religious expression. The investigation shows a clear practical proximity between two categories of belongings, the one of religious symbols and the one regarding community affiliation, and enables us to question the very nature of what is being evaluated by the agents.