The vexed question of how or what to refer to pupils at schools as has opened up again following Altrincham Girl's school decision to avoid referring to it's children as girls in what is a girls school and to use gender neutral language.
An awful lot has happened certainly around language since I left the school system and even as a Governor for a period at one least the retitling of 'Forms' for 'Year x' since the 1990's, the removal of the term Pupil and substitution of 'Student', a term I associate with those at 16+ college or University rather than say 8 year olds and yes we were always referred to as "Girls and Boys" in what was a co-ed school.
The reasoning preferred for all this is to be 'transgender friendly' and certainly personally I've no time for misgendering anyone but gender identity is a area that is complex and not the same as saying people are gender neutral although it is true some individuals may well feel 'non binary' and in principal I feel that ought to be respected.
Some as I can well recall from my junior and high school days feel very strongly about their identity and gender role as either boys or girls and to them while they would all agree they were 'children' the bigger thing to them is to be their gender and if you were misgendered or assigned incorrectly you may well understand why it matters to them.
That's why I get a bit concerned how far we may take well intentioned attempts to make spaces inclusive we end up degendering for those who feel they are misgendered.
I don't feel in the context of an introduction say at an Assembly "Good Morning Children" is an issue although traditionalists prefer "Boys and Girls" to mirror "Ladies and Gentlemen" but when you suggest you cannot refer to a group of girls as 'girls' least it cause offence to any girls in girls school who may be questioning their gender identity in which by design doesn't admit nor allow boys to be and your school sign refers to 'girls' a few thoughts come to mind.
Firstly if hearing or seeing the term 'Girls' offends or intimidate you to that point perhaps being at an all girls school isn't really for you because at the very least you'd rather mix children of either traditional gender or non binary which is more likely at an co-ed school.
If you feel as a girl you're non-binary or especially a boy, then there is gender question about what you are doing where an essential criteria is to be that gender and where if you were to transition you couldn't stay. Does your right to be say non-binary mean it's right to deny your peers the right to called girls to include you?
Finally if you are transitioning as a boy to a girl, you may feel as good number have you'd rather be at an all girls school because you'd be away from boys and their all too real separate genderedness but how would it play to be at a girls school where being being referred to as the gender you now present as is discouraged by official policy and where you'll never be referred to collectively as girls?
To me it just this in the context of an all girl or boy school comes over as muddled and ill thought out especially when you still refer to yourself as a Girls School.
This week the Church of England that apart from being an Established religion of Anglican Christianity here in the UK is a substantial provider of both primary and secondary education though its schools that are open to all, made a pronouncement around gender equality in a set of guidance issued to Heads and others running them.
In it it was clearly established that a culture of humiliation, intimidation and ridicule was not to be accepted within school for children with gender identity issues or have differing forms of sexuality from the mainstream was not going to be tolerated.
This covered staff but also from other children in the classroom.
In this the issue of childhood exploration of roles and identities through play such as dress up was addressed by saying a boy who wishes to wear a Tutu or a Girl who wishes to dress in attire associated with boys roles would be accepted without anyone saying "Don't be silly, pick something else" or with any acceptance of the same from that childs peers.
Some in the UK media read that as saying ordinarily in a class a boy might wear a Tutu but this wasn't about uniform so much as play and exploration of roles through it.
What was made very plain is in so far as presenting as either non-binary or in a gender different to that assigned goes, this is to be accepted and a child would be permitted to wear school uniform from with the range that in their opinion best suits them as that child.
In other words uniform was to be upheld but in a form allowing expression of a child's gender identity. Something socially liberal but fairly traditional sorts like me would agree with and indeed would of willing engaged with had it been an option for us at that time in our childhood.
While I'm not an Anglican I find much within this I can agree with as we do not send children into school to be intimidated or humiliated for just being the gender and sexuality they truly are.
Hello and welcome. This weeks entry coming from the patented Blogger scheduler because as those of you who have followed this blog and possibly may belong to 'Angels' know I do have a 'littles' side and that side of me is on a very much child-like vacation this week which being twenty-seventeen I can just come out and say that to you all.
There are couple of things I do want to talk a little about of which the first is I do welcome the consultation over the 2004 Gender Recognition Act and the noises coming from government making the process less intrusive because while that Act was a breakthrough at the time non the less it was still centred around a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, the sense in which you feel distress that your sex (aka your physical body) does not match your sense of Gender such as gender identity and gender role.
This was common associated with the process of transition -usually medical involving hormones and often surgery too to give you the legal identity of the gender you 'belonged' to and legal recourse during the process of transition in areas of civil and employment law.
I do feel moves that allow more for those who may not wish to go down the route (or perhaps cannot for variety of reasons) of medical transition should be able to get certification of being and wishing to be regarded in law as the gender they are with full legal rights.
The other thing is Periscope the Twitter app used by teens.
I don't wish to sound like a boring groan up but I do question the idea of allowing a thirteen year old the ability to in effect broadcast 'anything' online with no transmission delay and patently limited by nature moderation especially when coupled to GPS information on exactly where they are. It's practically impossible to monitor in real time every user and there is worrying evidence of it being for inappropriate sexual contact and grooming by pedophiles who know exactly where to find them.
Let's face it. Would any of us be allowed to run a radio or tv channel as a young teen with NO person to pull the plug if either we did something wrong or a person we were interviewing got out of hand? No, we wouldn't - we wouldn't be allowed unsupervised airspace so just what are doing allowing this???
