JENNI MURRAY: Why I believe we must now ban skirts in schools, once and for all

I was recently going through my wardrobe, wondering if it was too early to wear more spring-appropriate outfits, when I realized I barely own any skirts. I can’t remember the last time I wore one and opted for the comfort and ease of pants, jeans or leggings. You will no longer have to search for a pair of stepless tights that actually fit you.

How did this fashion-conscious girl from the ’60s, in the era of the miniskirt no less, turn so vehemently against this accepted feminine way of dressing?

The answer is to grow up, learn about feminism, and understand the terrible extent of sexual harassment.

And nowhere are these issues more important than in schools, where the skirt remains the statutory uniform. I remember well how the insistence that we wear them meant that we were continually subject to the leering looks and lewd comments of children.

You couldn’t even escape in a differentiated school, like my high school was. The boys from the grammar school would peek over the hedges to get a good look at us playing hockey, netball or tennis and the comments could be heard loud and clear. “Cor, that seems to me… shame about the big gray panties, but what’s inside looks good.”

It was the same while we all waited together for the bus. None of us dared sit on the upper deck; We knew they would be looking at our skirts as we walked up the stairs.

Looking back, the skirt restricted us in many ways. Who would have done a cartwheel on the playground or even ridden a bike to school? We would never do any physical activity that involved children being able to see our panties.

Sadly, it seems that all these years later, a new generation of girls suffers the same fate; Worse yet, with the ability to take upskirt photos and send them to her friends.

That’s why I think we should ban skirts in schools once and for all. I want all boys and girls to attend classes in pants and, for any sport, shorts. We need absolute equality between boys and girls in their uniforms.

New research by the University of Cambridge confirms my suspicions that school uniforms hold girls back. Forced by school rules to wear skirts, their freedom to participate in physical activities is severely restricted.

By looking at the physical activity levels of more than one million young people aged five to 17 in 135 countries and regions, including England, Scotland and Wales, researchers found that pupils with compulsory school uniforms, particularly girls of age to attend primary school, they were less likely to do so. the 60 minutes a day of physical activity recommended by the World Health Organization.

Lead author of the research Dr Esther van Sluijs said: “Social norms and expectations tend to influence what they feel they can do in these clothes.” Unfortunately, when it comes to promoting physical health, that’s a problem.’

This supports previous studies that found that wearing gender-specific school uniforms reminded children that they are a “boy” or “girl” rather than a “student.” In the context of gender and education, this could reinforce beliefs such as “girls don’t play soccer” or “boys don’t read books.”

The fact is that we have known all this for a long time. In school in the 1950s and 1960s, our dress seriously hindered the impact on girls’ confidence to be assertive and take whatever they wanted or needed from education, both intellectual and physical.

A new book out next week, Schools Of Thought, highlights how important assertiveness is for girls. Written by teacher David James and Jane Lunnon, former headteacher of Wimbledon High girls’ day school and now headteacher of Alleyn’s co-educational center in south London, it is based on the experience of several headteachers in empowering girls.

Clare Wagner, headteacher at Henrietta Barnett School, a high-achieving state school for girls in north London, said: “There is still a battle to fight and win.” It’s about how girls and women see themselves and carry themselves confidently in mixed-gender environments.

‘We definitely recognize the need for some of our girls to develop more confidence in the way they express themselves and present themselves. They tend to be very polite and express themselves too gently, and we need to make sure that as women they can be candid and take ownership of the spaces they will enter.’

Girls also need to own the spaces they are in now. And it can’t come soon enough, considering news of an alarming rise in sexual assaults on children by boys, particularly in high school.

A leading expert on the issue says the problem has reached “alarming levels” and there has been an 81 percent increase in reported incidents that have taken place on school property.

One of the crimes is sharing indecent photographs of girls. No wonder girls today are even more anxious than we are about boys looking up their skirts.

Of course, as everyone suggests, there is an urgent need to clamp down on the offensive material that under-18s have access to these days. But in the meantime, we must put an end once and for all to the leering of schoolchildren by banning the school skirt.

There have been numerous attempts before. Many of us told stories about how children made us feel uncomfortable because they could see our legs. We were also bullied outside of school by adult men. I guess we fulfilled the fantasy of the willing schoolgirl: pigtails, purse, short skirt, socks and all. Awful.

In 2015 there was a campaign to get schools to allow girls to wear pants. Some schools decided to change their rules and allow it, but Katia Chornik, who led the campaign on behalf of her daughter, described it as a long and bitter process and the Pants For All campaign ended in 2022.

So here it goes. I want to reset it. There were no ‘sexy’ skirts to look up at, no legs to ogle, no finely twisted ankles to shine. Take sex out of school. Then we will see girls from five to 18 years old get fit, confident, assertive and intelligent, without obstacles like boys. It’s called equal opportunities.

SORRY JOANNA, PJS ARE NOT FOR LADIES LIKE US

Now, I don’t want to be ageist (why would I be at my age), but really, what was Dame Joanna Lumley, 77, thinking when she stepped out at the Burberry show at London Fashion Week? London in pajamas? And green sunglasses in the dark? Maybe a 16-year-old girl could get away with it, but Joanna looked like she had forgotten to dress.

NAVALNY’S HEROIC WIFE DESERVES OUR SUPPORT

I have never wanted to cry before when a politician dies. But Alexei Navalny was special. I have followed his anti-corruption campaign against Putin from the beginning.

His courage was unprecedented. I have heard him say with determination that evil triumphs when good men do nothing. Now he’s gone and it’s up to a good woman to do something.

Yulia Navalnaya has supported her husband through everything: the attack on his life in 2020 with the deadly nerve agent Novichok and his years in the cruelest imprisonment in the Arctic. She now says what many will be afraid to articulate: ‘Putin killed my husband. I will continue the work of Alexei Navalny. And I ask you to support me.

I can’t imagine how he will do it and survive, but his courage deserves all the support we can get from all of us.

Evil must not triumph.

IT’S CALLED A BLACK LABEL EVENT FOR A REASON

Some of my favorite men lined up for pictures at the Baftas: Cillian Murphy, no doubt destined for an Oscar, Andrew Scott and Ryan Gosling, but oh, what a mess they looked. Smart suits, perhaps, but not a tie among them. Sorry guys, but for a black-tie event, just break out the black ties.

P.S.

When I was a child, I would sit at the breakfast table and stare at my favorite creamer, Lyle’s Golden Syrup. Today I am shocked to discover that the lion lying in the can that I loved so much is dead! I thought he was sleeping and the bees had just woken him up. Please don’t change it. The Old Testament derivation “Out of the strong came sweetness” is elegant; rebranding is not!