School telling me what title I should use

[mumofone1234]

My child started a new school in September. A few weeks into the new term I received an email from the school saying that they would like to change the title they have for me on their records from 'Ms' to 'Mrs' and if I am not happy with this then to reply to the email. I replied saying I would like to keep 'Ms' thank you very much. All has been fine since then. All communication has said 'Ms'.
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Today I get a letter addressed to 'Mrs Mumofone1234'? AIBU to wonder why on earth they care what title I assign myself? Is this a stealth way of finding out the marital status of parents? (It is a hard to get into school that goes off church attendance).

Most mail for me now comes to "parent of..", but when addressed school normally gets it right. EXCEPT the one time they got it wrong was when they had to write me a cheque and they put it to: Mr Husbands name and Mrs Husbands name. The wrong titles (we're both DR) weren't as bad as the fact I'm DR my name; they had to reissue the cheque as I had no way of cashing it (I could have cashed it if they'd taken the sexism further and just issued it to Mr Husbands name).

OP I'd complain to the school as they seem to have a new memeber of office staff who needs training.

mumofone1234

"Why would they care?"

So do you guys no longer think the union of a man and woman is the heart of the family etc now? Have you gone off piste/freestyle? Is the bible no longer what you preach from?

Sorry I know it's not a discussion for religion but as my Vicar is a single father who's children go to the same school as mine (which is attached to the church) he can hardly judge me for being a single mum. No one in my church gives a shiny shit about anyone else's marital status.

I use Mrs but I agree the default should be Ms.

It does seem a lot of effort for the school to email like that and potentially update a lot of details and it sounds like someone had a bee in their bonnet about it. I would email them back and ask what they are trying to achieve!

I don't understand why title is mandatory in so many forms where it is completely irrelevant. I expect to be addressed by my first name only in most situations, as I do for most people I meet. The only people I have worked with who really cared about their titles were surgeons, who only got annoyed if you accidentally called them 'Dr'

I think titles should be left in history.

Not sure why you have to know whether a person is a man or woman, unless you are planning on sleeping with them.

Also why do we have to know someone's job unless we are planning on employing them? I mean unless you are worried about accidentally employing a carpenter instead if an orthopaedic surgeon. But I'd hope you'd do more checks than that!

I honesty think this is an admin error or incompetence rather than anyone making a sexist or religious point. However, if it bothers you that much, you should continue to politely remind them each time in the hope they will improve procedures or at least think more.

When I started at a new work I kept getting called Miss on ad hoc paperwork. I was Mrs on the system but it happened in situations where someone must have had to type my name into a different format. I just kept correcting them until it stopped.

headofthehive I totally disagree! Unless you plan to fundamentally change the English (and most major) language, you cannot write about a person without knowing if they are male or female! Would you refer to them as they, it?

Not sure what you would be writing about!
If for example it was in a medical context, the title is not as helpful as you think. Biological males have different parameters re bloods than females. So we need to know the sex. Mr / Mrs are gender specific. So you can have mr Harry Jones, and tick female on the blood form.

Dr, Rev, capt. Are non sex specific, so the argument that they denote sex is misleading.

I designed a gender neutral signature ( my first two initials and surname which I have used every since, 30 years ago when I started work on feminist grounds. Immediately my boss male said I had to add Mrs. so that was the end of that gender neutrality. I am always Ms.

We could move as a nation to M. That would keep formality for when we need it and not be gender specific, obviously keeping Dr for doctors other than surgeons. My father was an NHS consultant but not a surgeon so was Dr. Both my daughter's parents in law are Dr. so that is Dr & Dr.

I don't like people and websites calling me by my first name by the way when they don't know me. So I often get emails from websites for marketing who usually would say Hello Mary instead saying Hello Ms E T

It really winds me up that there us still a Miss, Ms and Mrs and only a Mr. Master disappeared yonks ago, probably Victorian times.

There should be two, Mr and Ms. I am not the property of my father or husband.

Would you refer to them as they, it?

Of course you wouldn't. You'd refer to, "they," of if that's not clear, "the customer," "the client," "the parent," "the guardian," "the responsible person," "the patient," "the child," or whatever term is most appropriate. You can write something without having to use gendered pronouns in English more easily than in many other languages which are more inflected.

noblegiraffe it's not really "thinking" it's sexist, it is. I can't see how that could be disputed. Also it's not a free choice - if it was then as many men as women would change their surnames upon marriage. Regardless, there's no excuse for assuming "Mrs" and this is yet another reason the titles "Miss" and "Mrs" should be done away with.

I wonder why on earth they feel the need to do this?

taking this slightly off topic, because it's not about letters but speaking to someone:
titles matter in some cases. I used to work in a hospital lab, and we'd frequently have phone calls to ask for blood results. Some of the newer SHOs would blithely say "hi, it's Bethany" (or whoever) and then ask for results. CLEARLY we're not supposed to hand over results over the phone to anyone who asks for them, so we would refuse unless they announced themselves to be "Dr. X" (or a nurse/MW/med sec) etc.
Of course this system wasn't foolproof as anyone could have said they were whoever, and we didn't have any way of verifying it - but at least we tried by getting people to ask under their professional title, rather than some random first name who we wouldn't have known anyway.

This post is in reply to people who think all titles are unnecessary.

I'm not fussed now - but when I was young, I was brought up to believe that Miss was for unmarried, Mrs was for married and Ms was for divorced - I learnt my mistake fairly quickly, but for some reason that has stuck with me and I have never "taken" to being called Ms.

Technically speaking I'm Mrs Attack.

However as my initials plus dh's surname spell out a very rude word I don't use his surname.

So I use Killer, my maiden name instead. But I use Miss Killer, not Mrs. Oh, and I also don't wear a wedding ring.

Now that discombobulates people

Amy yes I know it's not a free choice but a cultural one but that doesn't change the choices that women have made, and neither does simply wanting it to be otherwise.

So if someone says 'it's probably an admin error because most women go by Mrs in X school', you can't say 'it's an outrageous error and an affront to women everywhere' if it's actually true.

noblegiraffe I think you can as if it is an admin error it's an admin error grounded in a sexist assumption due to the pressure on women and a culture which suggests we should change our names upon marriage, and the sexist existence of the titles "Miss" and "Mrs". Doesn't mean there was any malice involved (if it was an innocent error) but it's still something which should be pulled up.

Thumb I can see why a first name alone isn't sufficient in the scenario you describe, but given that only the doctors are 'Dr' (and remembering that surgeons are not) why would it be helpful to know if a nurse was a Mr/Miss/Mrs or Ms? Firstname Surname and department is what you would need surely? I used to work in a hospital where ID was required as we'd had issues with people getting into the wrong areas and not being challenged because they had picked up a white coat. Surely assuming anyone called 'Dr' is authorised to receive results is just as careless?

I may have told this story before. About a year ago I had to ring the council, and on answering the call they asked me for some details, including my title...

"I prefer no title thank you".
"I can't go past this screen without putting a title in".
"Ok, if I must use a title it's 'ms'"
"I don't have that option, it's miss or mrs".
"I'm neither of those".
"Shall I just put mrs".
"No, let's go for mr".
"... No, you're not a mr are you?".
"No, and I'm not a miss or a mrs either".
And so on...

It wasn't a comfortable conversation and we fell out with each other. I lost my cool and ranted about the whole system. I still get the occasional letter addressed to Mr Leaf though.

given that only the doctors are 'Dr'

Academics in non-medical research fields are also called Dr or Professor. Some academics might even be hanging around hospitals, doing e.g. social sciences research.

My title is Professor Y and my partner's title is Professor Z. Children have last name Z. Schools correctly address us as Professor Y and Z but in many other child related contexts we are addressed as Mrs and Mr Z - i.e. it is assumed that the parents of child Z are Mrs and Mr Z.

nooka - the nurses and MWs usually used their professional status - e.g. "this is MW Smith" or "nurse Jones" - their marital status was never an issue, of course! I was just saying why SOME titles are necessary in SOME situations.

I can confirm that this is alive and well... am used to living in London where title is literally NEVER used, kids school is first name basis for everyone etc... am considering moving back to Ireland, filled in the form to look at a school, my name, DH name, child myname hisname, no mention on the forms even if we are married etc, headteacher walks out of office and booms AH MR AND MRS HISNAME! I mean, WHY???? She didn't even know we were married! Ffs! This is an amazing school in amazing area where we can offer our kids an amazing lifestyle, but tbh it is quite traditional and I'm so scared of being labelled 'angry feminist one'. Although, post trump etc, maybe that is just who we have to be? It's just so surprising to find it so much NOT the norm.

Also, and have def told this story before, was invited to senior business women lunch by camilla duchess of Cornwall, and was told by her office that it HAD to be Miss or mrs as she 'doesn't approve of ms'!!!!! AT A LUNCH CELEBRATING WOMEN'S SUCCESS IN BUSINESS. Omfg. Obvs I just said 'well sadly you will be unable to invite me then as I ain't changing for her.'

Also Amy, I LOVE seeing you here and your stance, but would really love to hear what has happened to your friends in fifteen years. I felt EXACTLY like you twenty years ago and assumed everyone else did and that changing names was just something our mums and before had done... it was such a shock to be honest when all my friends started getting married and 95% changed their names and were super excited to do so and never questioned it. I am definitely the eccentric feminist odd one for not doing it. The amount of times I've been to a wedding and the bride has clearly nipped off to the loo to change her fb to married name... and these are all very educated women many with killer careers. It was the first time there was this huge weird mis-step, many of us, men and women, had been I thought super equal friends since uni and now all the women were like 'yes we're just dropping my name! His is more important! Can't wait to be a Mrs, eh?! Ooh yes and he asked my dads permission to marry me ISN'T IT SWEET SQUEE?!?!!'

Sorry I am very ranty here but in real life I obvs had to be completely silent and supportive as in many cases both halves of the couple my friends and I'd never comment on their choices, they're free to make them as am I. I just really was shocked. (And yes, enjoying a good rant about it here! So cathartic!)

One of the reasons I really like my GPs surgery is that their letters to us and our names on their electronic board are always correct.
I always flash up as Ms Myname, DS flashes up as Master MyName-DHname and DH as Mr DHname.

At work if I don't know someone's title and I can't check it on the computer I automatically put Ms.