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Original poster

Sexism in education

60 replies

Z0rr0 · 29/04/2020 16:33

Looking for examples of issues where girls are disadvantaged in schools and/or schools have found ways to tackle this (or not).
It's for a thing I'm working on.
Intersectional views including issues of class, race, disability, sexuality are welcomed.
Topics include uniform, menstruation, access to subjects, P.E., physical & mental wellbeing, safeguarding, sexual harassment etc.
Also interested in any orgs tackling these things and any recent amendments to govt law / guidance besides Equalities Act and access to menstrual products.
Who is active in this area?
Thank you.

OP posts:
PinkPlantCase · 29/04/2020 18:11

Anecdotally in my secondary school for years 10 and 11 they gave up doing proper PE with the girls. They’d send us on a ‘power walk’ around the local town. If they did team sports it didn’t work as not enough people could be bother to participate properly. Quite annoying for those of us who enjoyed PE.

PinkPlantCase · 29/04/2020 18:09

BBC did a series called no more boys and girls and was about gender stereotyping. The program was set in a school and I think took a class of 7 year olds. Covered things like the boys and girls having already developed different skill sets and the girls thinking they weren’t as strong even though at that age there isn’t any difference.

is a link to the first episode.
Original poster
Z0rr0 · 29/04/2020 18:04

@SignOnTheWindow Yes there is a lot on unfair policies around hair for BAME girls.
And yes that is shocking (although not at all uncommon) to tell the girls to curb their dress because of the males around them. Particularly bad in a girls' school!!

OP posts:
Original poster
Z0rr0 · 29/04/2020 18:02

Aww @katew355! Sad for your daughter! Hopefully that will change when they see how awesome she is!
But yes there seems to be a lot of evidence of inequality in PE.
It's good to hear that things are moving in the right direction.
I think our primary school has a mixed football team.

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SignOnTheWindow · 29/04/2020 17:47

I used to work in a girls' school, where the reason given for not allowing girls to shorten skirts or wear coloured bras under their white shirts was that it 'made the male teachers feel uncomfortable'. The students were - quite rightly - outraged by this response.

I haven't witnessed or experienced this first hand, but I understand from media articles that uniform policies on hair unfairly penalise black girls in particular.

katew355 · 29/04/2020 17:38

Things have improved significantly, however, I work in a primary school and they have only recently created a girls football team and it definitely doesn't have the same status as the boys team yet. Interestingly, my dd who is 8 recently joined the local town football club and some of the boys from the school I work at also go there and told her they won't pass to her because she's a girl ☹️

Original poster
Z0rr0 · 29/04/2020 17:38

Thanks @maddy68. Is it something the school works hard at? Do they have any specific programmes to ensure girls are fully included in all subjects and does that include all PE? Do teachers have any training to ensure there is no inadvertent discrimination?
I'll give you some examples I've heard from girls. That they have only 5 minutes between lessons and are sanctioned if they're late or if they ask to leave during lessons, therefore they are disadvantaged if they are menstruating.
That the menstrual pain they experience is downplayed or that they won't ask for pain meds because of embarassment.
That although girls can wear trousers, most wear skirts and that their wearing of the uniform is far more 'policed' than the boys; e.g. if they roll their skirts, if they have any other expression of gender eg makeup or jewellery, also not being allowed to wear practical PE uniform compared to the boys and often being told the reasons for this micro-managing of their appearance is because they could be distracting the boys.
If your school has tackled all these issues I would love to hear more about what programmes / initiatives they've put in place to address this. Thank you so much for your reply.

OP posts:
maddy68 · 29/04/2020 17:28

As a teacher I don't see a huge amount of discrimination of subjects , in fact in my school we have more girls than boys taking the sciences and maths (which wasn't the case 10 yrs ago ) menstruation , we have free San pro in every cubicle , uniform everyone wears trousers although girls can wear skirts if they prefer. Nothing obvious really

Original poster
Z0rr0 · 29/04/2020 17:26

@OhHolyJesus No, it's not. I'm bidding for a bit of work on this issue and already have a lot of examples, but it's not my niche so was just thinking I'd throw the net out a bit wider to see if anyone could point me at some other resources / research / law / orgs / anecdotes.

OP posts:
OhHolyJesus · 29/04/2020 17:23

Is this for a PhD OP?

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