Did you have to shower after PE?

[Quanon]

Question due to a conversation about when this became unacceptable. Was it ever OK? Really? I didn’t ever experience it but DH did, with a teacher enforcing that everyone showered properly. It’s surely not expected now in secondary schools for safeguarding reasons? Our kids certainly don’t.

Were you required to shower after PE at school?

If you could give me an idea of when (decade) and yes or no, it will help our discussion. I wonder if it was more boys than girl?

For us
90s, female, no
90s, male, yes after rugby (teacher watching)

80s female: yes.
None of my children shower at school now.

PE no (90s, female). We were supposed to use the communal showers after swimming but just used to run through in a towel sticking our arms and legs under the spray.

70's. We were supposed to but we didn't. Went to showers (no individual cubical) Wet our arms and ends of hair in case PE teacher came in. Got dressed.

In primary school and middle school I think no (can't remember for sure middle school) but in high school yes I am pretty sure we did although I don't remember and for some of the time we went swimming or bowling for PE

My school had showers but we were never allowed to use them. No idea why! Seems pointless to have built them if we weren’t going to be allowed to use them!

It was a brand new school which was built only a couple of years before I started, so the showers undoubtedly worked, we just weren’t allowed to use them. Instead we had to go straight from a sweaty netball game to maths class!

1998 ish

I hated PE at school

I don't think it was enforced because I heard rumours of people not showering.

Peer pressure was strong. We teens thought a person was utterly disgusting if they didn't shower after PE lesson. No adults needed to enforce showers on us. And since everyone fully changed & showered, nudity was not a big deal.

we did 1980s, was awful we just to to dunk in and out.

1980s seniors. Female. Yes we tried to get out of it but we're expected to shower after pe in single cubicles with flimsy shower curtains. I was actually surprised but glad when I was told it's no longer the norm.

Yes! Female, late 90s/early 2000s. We had run through showers - the teacher would pull the towel off you at one end, push you in and then hand you the towel again at the other end 😂

80s-90s, yes. And the PE teacher would check that we were properly wet and hadn't just splashed water on our arms and legs. That's terrible really isn't it?

Mid 90s male yes showers were compulsory my son now grabs a shower when he comes home

We were ticked off the register as we got out the shower, late 70s. You were excused if you had your period and a big red P out in the box in the place of a tick.

Only after some winter sports (hockey and cross country?) Particularly difficult while getting to grips with early periods. And yes, basically ran through showers. Didn’t actually get sweat off.

This!! We often tried that with bra straps lowered to try and fool the teacher. Rarely got away with it. Horrible.

90s, female - yes.
We also had to be fully undressed and the teachers stood there watching to make sure we showered. It was a communal room with just a line of showers on the wall amd we all had to walk through it in a line. Hated it.

I stopped PE and sports in 1990 and it was obligatory until then. Communal showers. Our female PE teacher used to stand at the entrance and mark us off on the register. Completely barbaric.

Teacher supervision though - as in, it was ok for them to see you naked? Surely not in the 90s?!

70s-80s. No-one ever used our school showers. Don't even know if they worked!

70s female. Communal showers. Definitely remember in the first form going in the shower a few times but it seemed to fall away after a couple of terms. Female teacher used to stand outside shouting us to hurry up and get washed 😀

I went to a 9-13 school from ‘93 - ‘97(96?) and showers post PE were firmly enforced for all outdoors sports (hockey, football etc) but not indoor stuff like gymnastics. High school enforced for the first year (yr 9) for outdoor sports but became completely optional after that - coincidentally (or not) a PE teacher left suddenly around that time and the rumour was she had behaved inappropriately in the showers with a student

Yes, 1980s, female.

Individual cubicles though, and not supervised. I used to go and stand in there for a couple of minutes wrapped in my towel and then come out without ever turning the water on.

I suppose when the school sports facilities were built (I'm going to guess 1960s in my school's case) not everyone had easy access to hot water at home. So it was a good thing that showers were offered and it may have been the only proper wash that some children got all week.

They did. Whether it was okay or not is questionable.