‘Sir’ and ‘Miss’ in schools is everyday sexism

[putyourshoesonnow]

To me the terms ‘Sir’ and ‘Miss’ are unequal because ‘Sir’ is a term of respect whilst ‘Miss’ has less gravitas as it has connotations of youth, juniority and marital status and can be seen as diminishing to adult women.

This has bugged me for a while, as I think it is exactly the wrong message that young people should be receiving in school.

A perfect alternative may not exist, but surely we can do better than this?

YABU - Sir and Miss are fine, no problem here
YANBU - Sir and Miss are too unequal and we should seek an alternative

Of course they know it and use it on and off but if I'm just passing in the playground or they're asking for more paper or something, it's "Hi Miss" "Miss can I have some paper". If it's a more formal or complicated situation they might do "Miss X" but it's a mouthful. Genuinely, people thinking that kids are subconsciously absorbing micro aggression here are WAY overthinking.

Our deputy head is a sir and is an effective twat who can't control the most docile class. I can silence the bottom set in Y11 with a raised eyebrow. The kids know what's what. I just asked my two teens if they think sir has more gravitas than miss or is taken more seriously...a resounding no.

Does anyone use the term Sir at school anymore? Mine and my kids school has been Mr, Mrs, Miss, Ms. At DD's high, they use the teacher's first names!

This has always bugged me too. My DCs' very good London comp used Sir and Miss.

I worked in state comps and was never addressed as anything other than Miss - apart from the occasional 'Mum' and latterly 'Nan' from a very embarrassed pupil!

I would have loved someone to call me Madam!

When I was in primary school I moved from a school in a pit village to one in a more middle-class area about a hundred miles away.

I remember being told off at the second school for calling the teachers “Sir” and “Miss”, as I had been used to. I decided, age 9, that it was a class thing. This thread has illustrated that it’s not.

Yes, this happens in our area.

Well, obviously - they’re children! Honestly, why do so many adults abdicate their critical thinking to kids?

I’m a primary teacher - most of the time any male teachers I’ve worked with get called ‘Miss’ too! Lots of the children who are Indian call the staff ‘teacher’, and we often get called ‘mum’ too. it really doesn’t bother me one iota. Lots of staff in secondary schools also call each other sir or miss.

I totally agree
It's misogynistic and demeaning to call women Miss and men Sir

I'm senior management in a secondary school and have mentioned this more than once and am astastonished that colleagues who I would otherwise think of as modern and equal see no problem with Miss.

But what to use instead of Miss?
I can't come up with a good alternative

I don't..but the OP and others are convinced that children absorb some implied sexism over the status of Sir and Miss. I'm saying they don't. They may decide through other means that things are unequal but this is not one of them, in my opinion.

In the 80s young children recently arrived from Ghana used to call me Auntie.

It should be like Hogwarts where they are all just “professor “

Madam sounds sarcastic to me

School I was at the female teachers could choose.
One chose Madam
One chose Sir
The others were all Miss.

So I'd assume they didn't mind Miss.

It’s Sir and Ma’am in our school.

No it really isn’t ffs

'Sir' was once - and to some extent still is - insisted on by schools as the form of address for male teachers. I doubt whether 'Miss' was ever insisted on by female teachers; I suspect it was coined spontaneously by pupils. I remember my mum recalling her schooldays and mentioning one teacher who introduced herself by saying: 'my name is Miss X, and you must never call me 'Miss'.

That would be excellent. Professor though is a professional title that teachers don't hold.

Am perfectly.happy being called Miss.I don't attach.layers of hidden meaning to it and get provoked into a sense of unwarranted grievance. Respect does not reside in the title pupils give us. It's something we generate.

Of course it’s sexist. It’s a hangover from the not so distant past when all female schoolteachers were ‘Miss’ because they would lose their job when they married.

I’m called by my first name. All staff use their first names. I’m still the teacher, no title needed.

In previous schools I used to correct from Miss to Mrs Louisiana. I’m perfectly happy as Queen, it’s what everyone else calls me after all.

And once they know these aren’t equivalent titles? What do they think then?

It’s a bit like how “guys” is now used as a group noun for people, both male and female - though of course no one would ever call an individual girl or woman a guy. The male term has become the default. I know a few younger women who hate that this has happened.

Once you see these things you realise how prevalent and normalised they are. Everyday sexism, as the OP says. Best to get the girls as used to it as early as possible. Boiling frogs.

Yes, it is. That you can’t or won’t see it doesn’t change that.

It could become honorary, if that’s the right word, like medical doctors being Dr, even though they don’t have a doctorate.