Zoe Williams -

ArabellaScott · Yesterday 20:38

That's comedy classic!

Blimey. You've got your own Michael Gove.

Oopsie 😂

Loads of single sex comps in London. In the north east where I Grew up the only single sex schools were private. I think it's very regional.

We could go back to 1707. You are our cousins and we love you.

https://twitter.com/WingsScotland/status/1751948351719817518

😶

Is it official SNP policy to destroy education in Scotland or is it just a by-product of their general incompetence?

I think it's different in Scotland, see article above.

I went to a single-sex comp. Huge relief. Some of the boys at my primary school were pretty unpleasant, and went on to do pretty unpleasant things as adults. It was a happy atmosphere and I'd choose the same again.

Definitely not the case that single sex schools are predominantly private. There are 5 single sex state schools near me. One is selective. 3 are community schools (ie. not academies), 1 a free school (academy).

Exactly my experience, with the addition that at my school in the 1970s when I was first there the only male members of staff were the Bursar and the janitor, neither of whom had anything to do with the girls. Every teacher in the school was a woman and a graduate in her subject, or the equivalent in the case of the Art, Music, PE and Domestic Science staff. Later on there were two male science teachers, but it was still a very female-led and dominated environment. I'm glad to have had that experience.

Also I feel I have to put a word in for our STEM teachers who were excellent at encouraging girls to pursue maths/science and even PE, although some of us had a strong allergic reaction to the latter.

Thanks - I didn't realise there were single sex comps.

None in Scotland anymore, after a bit of googling. The last one was a Catholic school, has admitted boys in the past few years.

'the majority of single-sex state schools in Scotland closed or were amalgamated in the 1970s and 80s'

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/nov/28/scotlands-last-all-girls-state-school-to-admit-boys-after-long-dispute

And girls in a single sex school will presumably have largely missed the formative experiences of low level sexual harassment, teenage boys pushing boundaries, and worse, that most girls encounter.

Exactly. I'd normally consider that a good thing, but the naivety that it's led to makes me pause.

For example, I presume Williams is blase about mixed-sex cubicles in fitting rooms in clothes shops. I'm not, and one of the reasons I'm not is because I remember the full range of behaviour from teenage boys, from the nice ones, to the ones who... were not. Some of them absolutely would have deliberately pulled back the curtain of a girl or woman changing in an adjacent cubicle. These days, they'd stick camera phones over the top.

There are quite a lot of selective state schools, as Nobin said, that are single-sex. But there are also a few single-sex comprehensives - or, rather, they used to be comprehensives, they're probably academies now.

You'll find that in areas with substantial Muslim populations there's often a preference for single-sex schools.

One rape a day in UK schools (a few years ago before the mixed sex loos nonsense really toook off, doubt it's improved). I think we can be pretty confident that single sex girls schools will be underrepresented in those stats.

And YY to the constant sexisim. My school actually wasn't too bad - all the 'craft' subjects were done on rotation by everyone, so half a term.of cookery would be followed by half a term of metalwork. But while the overall setup was egalitarian, the expectations of individual teachers were not. I was one of a very small number of girls doing A-level physics, and 1 of the 2 teachers for that didn't teach girls. At all. Never spoke to us directly, never asked us questions in class, would ignore ones we asked if possible, didn't come near our table. He'd mark handed in work, but that was it; during lessons the boys got all his attention.

The one time I had an actual conversation with him was when we'd both arrived early for a lesson and he attempted to make smalltalk by asking whether the book I was reading was 'a romance'. The reply of 'No, it's a strategic analysis of the battle of Jutland.' rather flummoxed him.

I was at an all girls state secondary school back in the day. No bullying I was aware of and I was not a cool
kid so I think I might have seen it, or it must have been low key and not widely visible. Lots of girls doing STEM subjects - why wouldn’t we?

I went to a single sex school and I found it good. I wasn't bullied and I didn't see any bullying (which doesn't mean that it didn't happen, I wasn't everywhere all the time). One thing I appreciate now that I didn't understand at the time was that I had zero awareness of girls not being allowed/able/encouraged to do everything, maths, physics, home economics, sport...

Not always private, but often selective.

There will be other factors coming into play - i.e. single sex schools are private schools (as far as I'm aware?) so different demographics.

Everyone I know who went to a single sex school wished they'd gone to a mixed sex school.

My school was shit, IDK if that was anything to do with it being mixed sex, though.

It's interesting about single sex schools.

I went to a private girls school and was bullied more or less all the way through. I used to think a mixed school would have been better.

I recently had a chat about school days with someone who went to a mixed school and her experience was so radically different to mine I had to rethink. Boys rating the girls breast size and attractiveness, exposure to porn, a general view that boys were better, minimal girls doing maths and science.

Whereas at my school the culture was that girls can do anything and there were more girls doing maths and science than humanities. Plus being ASD, I'd have been bullied wherever I was.

I think it's easy to have an idealized view of mixed sex if you had a crap time at a girls school but it isn't based in reality.

“Right now, you are covering your suprasternal notch,” says Navarro as our video call starts. Protecting my neck, in other words, “which is because there’s a man right in front of you”. That makes me chortle, because I love men.

Zoe is desperate to let us know she loves men. She also conflates 'fear' with 'dislike', which is perhaps telling.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2024/jan/24/how-to-spot-a-liar-10-essential-tells-from-random-laughter-to-copycat-gestures

And girls in a single sex school will presumably have largely missed the formative experiences of low level sexual harassment, teenage boys pushing boundaries, and worse, that most girls encounter.

Exactly. My experience of being in mixed schools is of being constantly harassed and bullied sexually - even in primary school.

This.