DD's school going co-ed - I'm really annoyed

[SomewhereOutThere]

Am I allowed to talk about a private school issue in FC? I know that can be polarising in and of itself, but my particular issue here is about something I feel strongly about as a feminist so I hope this is okay.

We heard yesterday that DD2's prep school is going fully co-ed. (Currently there are a small number of boys up to year 2, a relatively recent change which came alongside an assurance that the school would be staying single sex to 11.) It won't directly affect DD's lessons - boys are being phased in so her year group will remain all girls until she leaves in 3 years. (Though there will be younger boys in her playground which will change the atmosphere I suspect.)

But I'm annoyed that:

• There was no consultation with existing parents or (seemingly) staff, who were surprised.
• A four page booklet about the change continually refers to adding extra facilities to be able to absorb two 'genders'.
• The four page booklet also explains that staff will get extra training to refresh their prior experience/training in teaching co-ed to encompass 'the different ways in which girls and boys learn and their differing interests, strengths and weaknesses'. Makes me feel like there will be lots of the 'boys like science/girls like stories' bollocks which is bad for girls and boys.
• Most of all, in the whole 4 pages the fact that many girls learn better in an all girl environment, and are more likely to pursue STEM subjects, is not addressed! Nor is the fact that there will now be 3 co-ed prep schools in the town the school is in, an all boys school, and no all-girls school.

We chose this school back when my elder daughter was a toddler because I wanted an all girl environment. DD1 was able to be her zany self at this school - she's maths mad and that was massively encouraged, as was sport - she got into one there that she now plays at a county level. She moved on to an all girls senior school in a nearby city brimming with confidence and loves being just with girls. It makes me sad that the governors don't seem to give any weight to the fact that for over 100 years this school has offered that to girls.

Oh, and as they say themselves, they have an all time high of pupils enrolled. So they are 'doing it from a position of strength'. So I have no idea - despite the 4 pages - why they feel it necessary. Something about the needs of our future demographic after engaging consultants to research the strategic future. It must be right then, since a consultant says so. Nice to know that's what fees have been being spent on. (I say that knowing all about consultancy bullshitting to justify a high fee, since I work in a similar field myself!)

I feel like moving DD2 into the nearby city, since it is clear the new (male) chair of governors at her school doesn't believe in and support the importance of an all-girl education, which is my primary reason for paying private school fees. I've contacted the girl's schools this morning. But it'll mean a massively long journey for her on public transport, and might just be too disruptive at this stage - something the school is counting on, I suspect. Gah!

Year ending 2015 - 5.8 m net assets, 300 k cash, 500 k liabilities is true financial picture. Does anyone know what would be a healthy picture for an indy school with fewer than 500 pupils? Could the liabilities higher than cash just be a quirk of submitting accounts just before the start of a term when all the fees come in from parents? Or is it sign of trouble?

I think they are struggling. I had a look at my son's school's accounts on OSCR last night. It is one of the Edinburgh Merchant Company Schoold. Thecgroup had a huge amount of income and a huge expenditure but last set of accounts ended with £3m excess of income over expenditure.

The Edinburgh girls' school had an excess of income over expenditure of I think half a million. These are not directly comparable as these schools take pupils from junior nursery at 3/4 right through to 6th Year of Secondary at 18 but if your school has less income than it is paying out , then yes , it has a problem.

The language used on this section of Mumsnet is so anti male it is untrue.

Womens/girls only spaces are wondrous, supportive and much needed environments that break down gender barriers and bring out the best in females.

Mens/boys spaces are bastions of male privilege, "hotbeads[sic] of misogyny" and need to be smashed !!! Yeah, fuck the patriarchy !!

The boys and men that are like this and make these places so reviled are somehow not at all like the partners/sons of the posters though, who we really luv and stuff.

The old myth that even though girls massively outperform boys academically, they would do even better if segregated but yet boys would do worse if segregated (can't be arsed to link feel free to google) is oft repeated I see. And that this gap is boys fault for not trying hard enough !!

Finally, how anyone who thinks children should be segregated on the basis of their sex and how much money their parents make, can with a straight face claim to be interested in equality and fairness is utterly beyond.

me....

Are cash/liabilities the same as income/expenditure?

You need to see if you can see from the accounts what income they are getting in and what they pay out. From what you have said they don't seem to be getting enough money in to meet what they have to pay out.

The OSCR site was very easy to follow- the schools I looked at clearly had more money coming in as fees than they paid out as running costs. I didn't look at assets-I know the asset value will be enormous.

I'll look at that, cheers.

Net assets will just be buildings and stuff.

Pupil number trends and forecasts will be key.

I'm really sorry but I think it is irresponsible to say that the school is struggling from those numbers, particularly when there are parents on the site who might be worried by that. Cash/liabilities is a completely different question from income/expenditure.
The truth is that you can't tell anything from those numbers and need to look at the accounts in detail. The cash:liabilities ratio is only helpful if you know when the liabilities are due and it only gives you a small snapshot of one part of the financial health anyway. The purpose of the school is not to accumulate cash.

I didn't say it was a sign of trouble. There has been capital outlay into new building work of late which any parent there will know, and which perhaps explains the difference in cash and liabilities.

I'm also trying not to negatively affect the reputation of the school by not naming it so this doesn't show up in internet searches. I care about this school - my daughters have been/are educated and cared for there very, very well.

If other parents there feel worried then I suggest it is because of the heavy handed approach from the governors to making a major change without consultation. Speculation about whether that was ideological or a response to a weak financial position or merely an attempt to grow larger is surely looming large for all of us?

I feel incredibly strongly about co-ed schools, I genuinely believe that the presence of boys is strongly positive, it breaks up some of the cliqueyness of girls and helps to dilute some of the intensity of girls relationships. A decent co-ed school will not have subjects which are cool for boys and not for girls, it's just not like that in reality. I've only positive experiences of co-ed. Obviously, if you signed up to a girls school then it's a shock but I think that there are so many positives in a mixed environment especially in a good school not least that it offers girls the chance to be them, to be a bit different and to build really strong and positive platonic relationships with boys.

I went to both an all girls school, and a mixed school at secondary level.

There were cliques at both (the skirts were shorter on the cool girls at the mixed school though!).

The mixed school was, in general, a friendlier place to be day to day.

BUT at the girls school, I never had anyone grab my breasts or ping my bra strap, or try to spy on me in the changing rooms (ha, I could choose to wear trousers or a skirt (except for PE where it was gym knickers and hockey skirt), I was able to do Physics and CDT, computing and Maths with no comment. At the mixed school, I had to wear a skirt, I was the only girl in both CDT and Computing, and one of 2 in Physics (which I was hounded out of by the teacher, who steadily picked on me as he was well known to not like girls in his class)

It's obviously just one small sample, but there is a difference, and if I had girls, I wouldn't feel bad about giving them the freedom I perceive in going to an all girls school. As it is, I've found a friendly international school for my boys.

You are of course entitled to your opinion, and it is one that others share. That's why there are plenty of co-ed schools around.

My own experience of both co-ed and all-girl schools, alongside the data, leads me to another opinion and it saddens me that some boys continue to have this option locally and girls do not.

That was to Stilitz.

Choc my experiences were much like yours. And I suspect that some aspects of this have changed for the better in many co-ed schools but the data shows that they have not changed enough as on average girls thrive more in an all-girl environment.

I just think that if someone was advocating ethno-culturally segregated schools they'd be regarded, rightfully, as a total nutter. I don't see what's so different about gender.

Nothing is more inimical to harmonious gender relations than a load of boys together getting all their ideas about girls from porn rather from relationships with real girls; and girls all together getting all their ideas about boys from Mizz and Seventeen and..er...porn. And developing crushes on their teachers.

That's rubbish that.

Make a case for single sex schools all means, but please don't do so under the banner of feminism. Because however far you stretch feminism as a definition, they remain the counter-feminist anachronisms that they are.

Many feminists support all-girl schools until mixed schools work out how to combat societal bias towards girls being expected to perform femininity, querty.

You disagree - fine. I'm not telling anyone else that they should send their girl to an all girl school, only that it's an option I'd like available.

If what was happening in my town was that all the single sex preps were going co-ed I would be less annoyed, actually. At least it would be consistent. But boys will continue to have that choice and girls won't.

Many feminists support all-girl schools until mixed schools work out how to combat societal bias towards girls being expected to perform femininity, querty.

I'm not sure what that means. But fair enough.

Qwerty, as a man please stop telling women how to do feminism. You disagree with the OP, but I can see both sides (though like you I am not a fan of private schools) and I don't believe hers is an inherently non feminist position. She's right that it allows girls to focus on their education free from an atmosphere of sexual harassment.

She's right that it allows girls to focus on their education free from an atmosphere of sexual harassment.

I don't believe she is correct in that view, sorry. Her view implies sexual assault is an inevitability of male/female coexistence - which why it was held by hidebound chauvinists in the era when single sex schools were prevalent.

I as a male was sexually assaulted by a girl at my school. And bullied by girls. Does that imply I should have been in an all male environment, protected from them? No.

If you separate boys from girls then misogyny will get worse - particularly as boys will derive their understanding of females from pornography and a sexist media rather than equitable friendships with girls of their own age. They'll eventually have to be together anyway: in colleges, universities and workplaces and the military. And because they haven't grown up learning to relate as equals there will be big problems. Or even bigger problems than there already are.

I'm against single sex schools because in my view they are harmful to children, and are hotbeds of bullying where negative gendered perceptions calcify rather than get challenged.

That's your opinion, and I can see why you hold it. She has a different one.

Ah, Querty is male? That makes more sense now. Thanks Venus.

If you want to keep displaying the kind of male privilege which sums up why my daughters love an all-girl learning environment then go ahead, Querty. As well as serving as a useful example, it bumps this thread, so thanks in advance!

What happened to you has nothing to do with structural oppression though. Whereas girls dealing with the much bigger problem of sexual harassment by boys and men does. So it's a valid feminist position.

There are two things at play here. What I want for women - ie my utopia, which is that we're all treated fairly, and what I do to deal with the reality of now.

Eg. In my utopia, we can all wander around at all hours of the day and night and be completely safe. In reality, I won't wander around the rougher parts of the city waving my phone around.

In my utopia, all the kids will be raised equally, all the teachers will be prejudice free. In reality, many teachers have pre-conceptions, enough boys will be raised to disrespect girls.

Dealing with the reality - yes I might make un-feminist decisions - because I'm not going to sacrifice my kids on the altar of my principles.

however the point here is that boys do still have the option of single sex education, but girls don't.

You summed up what is going on in my head better than I have Choc. YY to all that.

Yeah that's right Somewhere, everyone who is male is automatically displaying their male privilege when criticising anything a feminist says. All of them. How convenient. Just like everyone who criticises porn, prostitution or the sexual abuse of women is a 'feminazi' having a go at the poor menz.

This is a real trend on online debate. And it's not just an issue with stuff like this. If you're Jewish and critcise Hamas war crimes you're an 'Islamaphobe' and if you're a Palestinian and criticise Israeli war crimes you're an 'anti-semite'. Identity politics eh? Always great to fall back on when you haven't got an argument. If you're at a loss, just tell your opponent they're 'mansplaining'.

And I don't know what male privilege you think I have. I barely have enough money to eat let alone fund a private education for my children. And I never will do so long as I live. I'll probably die in relative poverty - and that's fine, I'm not complaining. But please don't tell me I'm privileged.

What feminists cannot get to grips with is the fact that working class men are socioeconomically the most discriminated against group of people in society at the moment. In fact, economics does not really come into feminist discussions of gender relations at all.

I respect your decision, and your reasoning to some extent. It is indeed your choice. But I object to your argument that single sex is good for society, and I've explained why.

We can't justify everything in terms of individual choice. If was saying it was my choice to use the sexual services of Eastern European call girls and that's the end of it, then you'd think, rightly, that I was fuckhead.

however the point here is that boys do still have the option of single sex education, but girls don't.

Should it no arguably be the case that neither have that opportunity? Single sex boys schools are no better than single sex girls schools. in fact, they're arguably worse. Look at places like Eton which are basically bastions of male privilege.