Gender equality doesn’t come naturally in schools

When Early Stage Researcher Salla Myyry was studying to become a primary school teacher, she also wanted to complete courses in gender studies. She hoped that as a teacher, she could do her part to promote gender equality in schools. 

“However, I noticed already during my studies that there was no dialogue between these two fields. The ideas discussed in gender studies lectures were met with disinterest in teacher education.”

For Myyry, issues relating to gender equality were important and she wanted to learn more about them.  After graduation, she started working as a primary school teacher. 

“I soon realised how difficult it was to discuss interpretations of gender in the context of school. It felt like the more I learned about the matter, the further away my colleagues’ ideas and the everyday life of the school seemed to be.” 

Eventually, Myyry decided to quit her teaching job and pursue her calling as a researcher. 

“Although the principles of the 2014 national core curriculum contain novel interpretations of equality that highlight gender awareness, the everyday life of schools is often quite different. The national core curriculum needs someone to interpret it and to put into words what these things mean in practice, and what schools could do to promote equality.” 

Myyry hopes that one day, she could be that someone – a person who would visit schools to talk about, and to inspire discussion on, gender equality.

Conflicted curriculum

The national core curriculum is a manifestation of how gender equality is seen in different times. In a way, the principles of the national core curriculum create a link between national definitions of education policy and the activities of schools.  

“This means that the obligations and interpretations of gender equality recoded in the national core curricula serve as a guideline for schools. In the end, however, each school will make its independent decisions.”

The first sub-study of Myyry’s on-going PhD project focuses on how interpretations of gender equality have changed in the principles of the national core curriculum from 2004 and 2014. 

“The role of schools in building equality hasn’t been questioned in the national core curricula before. But gender awareness, which has now been introduced to education policy, takes a more critical stance towards the operational culture of schools. This is new in Finland.”

There are also inconsistencies in the latest national core curriculum. On one hand, it still contains interpretations of equality that maintain gendered structures, while on the other hand it also talks about gender awareness, which is used to challenge these old structures. 

“These ideas are in downright conflict with one another and, unfortunately, they aren’t explained or described to a sufficient extent.” 

Getting under the skin

With the introduction of gender awareness, Myyry says that the text of the national core curriculum now, for the first time, looks at basic education as an institution that can not only promote gender equality, but also maintain unequal structures. 

“Although the gender aware interpretation of gender equality has gained a more prominent role in the national core curriculum, I still assume that old habits die hard and strongly present in our schools. I’m certain that gender aware thinking will face resistance in the practices of the comprehensive school, because gender aware interpretations challenge established patterns of thought that are based on binary ideas of gender.”

Breaking these patterns isn’t easy. Moreover, making one's own practices visible and reflecting on them is usually experienced as hard. 

“I know that I get under the skin when I address these issues and talk about them with teachers. But my point isn’t to offend anyone, although this is a topic that calls for critical examination.  If we don’t see the problem, we can, for example, contribute to the discrimination of sexual minorities and promote gendered education paths without even realising that we are doing it.” 

Non-binary gender deserves recognition

In any case, Myyry is pleased with the change that, according to her research, is taking place in interpretations of equality. 

“Schools could start with acknowledging that they have students who find the binary categories of gender too narrow. They, too, deserve to be recognised.”

Being in denial or closing one's eyes certainly aren’t solutions. 

“We all have both masculine and feminine features. If one can see this plurality in oneself, it’s fair to ask why we should have just two categories of gender.” 

Finding a group one identifies with is important but, according to Myyry, there's no point in settling for just two alternatives. What’s more, it limits thinking.

“I’ve had students whose experience of their gender isn’t in line with their bodily features. Some, for example, have felt that they can’t use the boys’ or girls’ locker room. Giving these students an opportunity to get changed somewhere else really isn’t taking anything away from anyone, now is it?” 

Good girls and wild boys

Myyry points out that students in schools get categorised on the basis of their gender almost on a daily basis.

“In the everyday life of schools, practices such as assigning students to their seats by gender, are still alive and strong.  Teachers think it’s a good idea to assign every second seat to a girl and every second to a boy, so that ‘good girls’ can calm ‘wild boys’ down. In reality, both genders have individuals who can be described as calm or wild.” 

These kinds of cultural conceptions of gender should now be made visible. In addition, it should be shown that they have been built in relationships between people and that they are not based on biological factors.

According to Myyry, there is no need to get rid of the categories “girl” and “boy”, but she hopes for other alternatives to be acknowledged as well, and for them to become a natural part of the activities of schools.

“Awareness thinking can be summarised into three points. First, the school community should acknowledge that there are students in the classroom who identify as girls, boys and non-binary. Second, the school community should look inside the gender categories and see the individuality of girls, boys and non-binary people. And finally, the practices of the school community should challenge stereotypical assumptions of what different groups of people are like.”

An ongoing process

The gendered expectations and practices rooted in the operational culture of schools are sometimes referred to as “the hidden curriculum”: students are guided towards and raised into gendered roles silently and unconsciously, and the matter remains unaddressed in definitions of education policy.

Myyry says that when she worked as a teacher, she would sometimes try to divide her students into groups by the colour of their socks, to pick an example. Her colleagues would then point out that the school's traditional way to divide students into groups was by gender, because “that’s just the best way to do it”. 

“That's why I’m glad that gender awareness and active promotion of gender equality are now mentioned in the national core curriculum. That gives teachers something to lean on, and they can use it as a tool in their work.” 

Besides, it’s always possible to change the way things are done. 

“I myself don’t always know how to do things in a gender aware manner and free from stereotypes. This is something that calls for ongoing critical examination and efforts from all of us.”

And change doesn’t happen overnight when a curriculum with new policies is published. 

“Real change happens in the classroom when teachers start to think about what kind of students they have and what their backgrounds are. Only then will people be seen as individuals and not as representatives of a gender.”