Sexism in education

[Z0rr0]

Looking for examples of issues where girls are disadvantaged in schools and/or schools have found ways to tackle this (or not).
It's for a thing I'm working on.
Intersectional views including issues of class, race, disability, sexuality are welcomed.
Topics include uniform, menstruation, access to subjects, P.E., physical & mental wellbeing, safeguarding, sexual harassment etc.
Also interested in any orgs tackling these things and any recent amendments to govt law / guidance besides Equalities Act and access to menstrual products.
Who is active in this area?
Thank you.

Our school split into ‘houses’ recently.

Three named after men. One after a woman. But they’d included a white man, a black man and a gay man, so they patted themselves on the back for inclusivity anyway. I know they did, because I protested (too mildly) that a 50:50 split would be better and that’s the answer I got.

Ooh, thanks @NeurotrashWarrior I'll have a look.

@GuppytheCat Sigh. Well done for trying anyway.

I would have hated being forced to wear trousers. I am busty with curvy hips, wearing a skirt helped me hide my bum and hips. I had enough issues with people staring at, and talking about my breasts, I didn't need tight trousers highlighting my backside as well. The boys in our sixth form used to grope our bums, especially when girls wore trousers. The school was all girls except for the 6th form

Also, when on my period I preferred to wear a skirt and thick tights. I always worried people would notice the shape of my pad in the school uniform trousers. If I leaked a bit into my tights it was easy to change them - I always carried a spare pair in my bag.

I still wear skirts and dresses on my period mostly wear skirts and dresses to work. I only wear jeans at the weekend and some casual Fridays.

At school we had to do PE in tiny shorts, which we hated. They weren't far off hot pants. We were allowed to wear a skirt over them for some activities like tennis and netball, but running was always outside in winter in tiny shorts. A lot of gardens backed onto the school field, as did a pub and hospital, so people could easily see us outside in these tiny shorts. It had to be extremely cold before we were allowed to wear tracksuit bottoms. At least gym was indoors!

The school I used to work in does not allow girls to wear trousers. I always thought that was prity outragous.

I don't know how to phrase this but I think some behaviour schemes at a primary level are about boy's behaviour and not about girls.

But girls behave badly too - just in different ways. I am thinking about bullying between girls and the huge impact it can have on a girls day.

I am finding this difficult to explain as why would expecting boys to behave like civilised humans be a negative to girls education because obviously we need the boys to be civilised! But there is something going on. Girls cannot simply be perfect and boys terrible. So where is the scheme that supports social interactions between girls by rewarding / sanctioning more typically female 'bad' behaviours.

Lack of pockets in blazers for girls, they have tiny pockets.
Used to calm disruptive boys through seating plans.
Lack of girls in STEM, I have a son in 6th form and there are no girls doing computing at all, v physics 1/5th girls and 1/6th girls in maths.
Such a lot of girls are doing options like photography (which in itself is not a bad thing but if taken to degree level, there are more photography graduates every year in uk than photographers working in the business across the whole of Europe).

We should probably also look at toilet policies.

Many girls are getting urine infections as a result of not drinking in school because of being refused access to toilets in lessons.

And of course there have been cases that have made the news where girls have bled through their clothing on account of being refused access to toilets.

Thr English Lit. curriculum my son followed at GCSE consisted of all male writers:
Shakespeare, Othello
An Inspector Calls, J.B.Preistly,
War poets, mainly Seigfreid Sassoon
Dickins, Christmas Carol.
I thought it was odd because there are so many good female novelists, but I heard somewhere that they were trying to interest boys more in English by choosing male themes.

Tey introduced trousers at high school when I ent in the 90,s most chose to where skirts. My daughter chooses to where skirts rather then the trousers at her school too. She plays rugby and football but she is quite girly so these are not her thing. (Boys don,t play netball though.)