So someone said to me today [paraphrasing] 'girls don't need educating beyond secondary school'

[ShellingPeas]

She is a mother of two girls (both academically able), went to a highly rated girls grammar school and is degree educated. Her opinion being that (a) going to a top grammar only led her to believe she was nothing more than average and (b) at best the girls will end up by having a brief career and then giving it all up to have children anyway (which she has done).

Your views please...

Mine being that girls should get every opportunity to be as highly educated as boys and, even should they have children, it doesn't mean the end of a career. Or, as in my case, they can reinvent themselves and build a whole new career in a different area.

Everyone should be encouraged to make the most of themselves. I do agree with her that the higher the standards set by those around you, the less impressive you can feel.
I HAve postgraduate qualifications but becuase those arund me have that or better I feel a bit thick . Would never use that as an excuse not to educate my daughter .

Feel sorry for her kids - more and mroe women are choosing not to have kidsand some can't. How can she possbily judge and make htat decision for them?

I think that everyone should be given the opportunity to reacn thier full potential. I've got 3 DD's. DD1 has been through university and finished with a first class degree, She has just done a PGCE in Biology and is now teaching. DD2 is about to starther 2nd year at uni and DD3 is 18 and dyspraxic but she has just started the IT BTECH First Diploma at college, Yes she is a couple years behind where her sisters were at this age but she is geting there and she says she might want to go to university in the future. This woman should be encoraging her girls to do what they want to and what they are able to do..

Wow. That's so odd.

Leaving aside the fact that your friend is clearly a time traveller from the 1920s ... has it not occurred to her that, er, her daughters are not clones of her, and they may not want the same things from life that she's opted for?

I never cease marvelling at these people who do not seem to realize their children are actually people in their own right, rather than extensions of themselves.

As Nigella Lawson says. that is a very vulgar attitude to education! Why does education have to have a 'point' ? Nobody has any idea how their life will pan out and everyone should stay as open as possible to opportunity, as well as learning to the best of their ability for the simple sake of learning. Why on earth would this person want to limit her own children - 'tis madness.

I am a governor at a primary school where many parents believe that.

Many girls will be engaged at some point during year 11 and be married when they're sixteen/seventeen. It's a real problem.

Yes, I've heard that before. From the same people who like to say that if your husband WOH then it is right and proper that you clean everything, cook everything and do all the childcare.

I read a piece once (in the New Statesman, of all places) which said that the opening up of tertiary education in the 60s simply meant that places were taken by averagely-bright middle-class women (rather than being filled by the brighter people who came from working-class families, which would have increased social mobility further) and the contribution to the economy has been slight because most of those women fell back into being childcarers after a brief flirtation with a career. Of course, mediocre men simply carry on being vaguely prosperous...

Agree about reinvention (you are advantaged if you have a degree, it's as simple as that) and agree that education isn't always a means to an end anyway, it can bring intangible pleasure to life at a time when you still have the financial buffer of your family.

WIth your tongue firmly in your cheek, you could suggest to your friend that the £XK that she pays to educate her daughters at university will be repaid to her once the daughters have found more financially prosperous husbands - less likely to be tapping her for cash as adults.

I think its very sad. My MIL's parents had this attitude. Despite getting a scholarship to Cambridge to read natural sciences, she wasn't allowed to go and was sent to secretarial college instead. SHe has put herself through an OU degree since but it still rankles.

More to the point, even if women do stop working while they have young chidren, they could still have 20 years or more of career especially if the retirement age is going up.

Personally, I think we should be campaigning to increase flexible working and encourage men to take it as well as women so that a less linear career becomes the norm.

That is just the most horrible thing I have heard. I speak as someone with a PhD, so obviously I have made certain choices in life. But I cannot believe someone would not think that any person, regardless of gender, should be allowed to follow up on interests, develop skills, make discoveries, learn and learn, and, shock horror, some of this may not even be relevant to the labour market.

That really IS sad, and so worrying that her views may actually affect her daughters' lives.

I graduated in 2009 and am now 19 weeks pregnant - at no point has anyone said, 'oh, waste of education then'. Women can and do keep working and using their brains afeter childbirth, god!

And we shouldn't forget, that learning and education are a real pleasure for some people. Denying daughters that is just cruel.

I have a friend who regularly comments that it doesn't matter if her 7yr DD doesn't concentrate at school. She'll just be marrying a man and raising children. My friend is relieved that her DS works hard at school as he'll be supporting his family.
I can't help thinking that having such low expectations for a daughter (especially when comparing her to a brother) can only have a negative impact on her self esteem and put enormous pressure on her to become 'attractive' to men.

Any chance she was just having a bad day and feeling frustrated by having "wasted" her degree?

wow

am not sure what else to say really

am still doing the job I was doing before I had my kids, which requires a Phd

education is all about opportunities, why would you want to limit someone's opportunities because of their sex? how very victorian