How Gender Safe are we?

Students, irrespective of their gender must feel comfortable in a protected and secure learning ecosystem. Governments, schools, teachers and students all have a significant role to perform in confirming that schools are free of hostility and prejudices and provide a gender-sensitive, superlative learning experience.

Schools are responsible for dealing with school-related gender unfairness by providing all-inclusive health education. Teachers should follow professional guidelines and codes concerning suitable corrective practices and deliver balanced instruction. And students must conduct themselves in a non-aggressive manner.

Gender issues at school are hardly ever physical but habitually psychological; they can occur on campus or while the students commute to and from school, and they may include mistreatment, verbal and emotional abuse, intimidation etc. It is often committed as a result of gender stereotypes and a lack of demonstration of gender equality on campus.

While a considerable number of teachers are caring professionals who put the best interest of their students first, there are quite a few who require a deep understanding of the impact of gender biases and their consequences.

Professional codes of conduct for all staff can be effective in plummeting the graph of gender inequalities at school if they clearly mention violations and enforcement protocols. As a leading Day Cum Boarding IB continuum school in Coimbatore we insist that our Teacher's Code of Conduct specifies that teachers should protect student’s emotional, mental and spiritual health and well-being and should ensure equal participation without discrimination, including on the basis of gender.

Students are also trained by our qualified teachers to be responsible for their behaviour so that it does not intrude on others’ right to education. The IBO’s mission statement itself reinforces this so strongly: “….These programmes encourage students across the world to become active, compassionate and lifelong learners who understand that other people, with their differences, can also be right”. As an IB Continuum School, the first in Coimbatore we very strongly endorse this philosophy not merely as a statement but as one of our finest practices also. Besides, we model clear etiquette for students and outline unswerving instruction, performance tracking and development measures for all staff.

Despite the fact that there has been encouraging progress in the management of females in classroom methods and curricular materials, it is exceedingly precipitous to affirm success and dismiss issues of gender bias. Today students remain the objects of gender stereotypes in content and learning materials. Most teachers care deeply about the youngsters in their rooms. However, many teachers who analyze their own attitudes and behaviours discover the subtle and pervasive nature of gender inequity in the classroom.

Here are a few tips to provide a Gender Neutral Approach to learning

a.     Use language that challenges binary notions of gender

b.     Help students understand the difference between patterns and rules

c.     Question limited depiction of gender

d.     Recognise gender is about our hearts and minds

e.     Support process of reflection

f.      Teach empathy and mutual respect