7th March 2025
HEADLINES
By James Saunders
ACCELERATE ACTION Happy Friday everyone. I am going to kick things off this week with a riddle: “A father and his son are in a car accident. Sadly, the father dies. The son is rushed to the A&E. The attending surgeon looks at the boy and says, ‘I can’t operate on this boy. He’s my son!’ How is this possible?” I will come back to the riddle in a moment. Now imagine an equal world. A world free of bias, stereotypes, and discrimination. A world that is diverse, equitable, and inclusive. A world where difference is valued and celebrated. Tomorrow is International Women’s day (IWD) and I am sure the media will be filled with inspirational stories of talented women from across the globe. As a young boy I can only remember a few inspirational male role models. Ok, there was my father. And screen icons Rambo and The Terminator. However, it was female musicians that had the greatest influence on me and helped me develop my love for music: Tracy Chapman; Nina Simone, Lauren Hill, Annie Lennox, Nenah Cherry and Kate Bush to name a few. These women managed to express themselves and the art form without the misogyny and violence that plagues so much of today’s male dominated world of rap. Does this make me a feminist? Surely the very nature of our jobs as teachers must make us all feminists. We should surely never favour one learner over another. We should treat them all equally. And that is what being a feminist is. For me it is simply about equality. All our learners deserve an equal opportunity to receive the same high quality teaching and support that enables them to achieve great outcomes and a happy life. International Women’s day reminds us that equality still very much needs to be on our radar
and as a society we must still strive to achieve parity for all every single day. Whilst the theme of international women’s day is the backdrop to this week’s headlines, equity is something that permeates all parts of society as well as being one of our core values. We can sometimes forget the difference between equity and equality when making decisions around school. Usually the root of this misunderstanding is our perception of fairness. We often think that fairness is consistently treating everyone the same; in some contexts this is the case. However, if we are to embrace our core value of equity we must appreciate the nuances that often exist for individuals and their circumstances. So for International Women’s Day and beyond, let’s clear a path for our girls to lead. The following video stimulates thinking and illustrates my point pretty well. It is about the misconceptions and stereotypes that exist regarding women in leadership - or rather lack thereof. International Women’s Day- Can You Solve the Riddle? (Mindspace) It is very similar to the riddle I posed at the start of this piece and contains the same message. Did you crack it? The surgeon was the boy’s mother. IWD reminds us that we can all positively impact how girls see themselves and their possibilities. One thing is clear - even our wonderful school culture is not impervious to the effects of stereotypes and societal pressure on girls. Misogyny and a lack of respect for the talents of girls is still a societal issue as we continue to battle the influence of social media. For too long leadership has been seen as the domain of men and globally continues to be dominated by men. I say this with full acknowledgement that I am a man. Girls need to see themselves as leaders and recognise their skills, qualities and attributes as something positive. We must collectively get real with girls.