ADG - do you see it as a problem that gender difference theories in education are seeing boys and girls being offered different ways of learning? "Different" doesn't have to mean "worse" or "less-respected" in our regular secular schools;
Firstly the schools that tend to flog the "different ways of learning" idea re the sexes tend to be the single sex posh private schools. The boys only schools have a bit of a hard time with this as the popular beleif is that while girls learn better in single sex environments, boys do better in co-ed. So you then have the ridiculous situation where many parents send their girl to an all girls school and use other peoples daughters for their son's co-educational needs. *rolls eyes*
Now further research into this popular notion has recently shown that it is basically not true. As far as I am concerned co-ed is best for BOTH girls and boys.
As for teaching styles - again it comes down to the child, not what's in their pants. I know what style of teaching suits my children best. At primary level at least (given the school has more than one class for each grade) I have been able to write to the school and (while I cannot request a specific teacher), I can certainly ask that my child be put into a class with a teacher with a "such and such" teaching style as this would *insert education jargo here* and "deliver the best educational outcomes" for my child.
What concerns me about the SES schools is that they stick to very defined gender lines where boys play cricket and girls play netball and never the twain meet. And looking at the children's work posted on the schools site you see this AGAIN in their academic work. Girls write poems describing flowers and boys write strident declarative pieces about destiny or some such. At the british school a subject called "Art of Hospitality" is mandatory for high school girls, but is only offered as a summer extra-currricular for boys.
So you see where I am concerned about equity of access issues.
As for the allegations of "grooming" those girls to be wives for older SES males...well, that just sounds repugnant. If it was said that the girls were taught about the running of a household and all that being a stay-at-home wife entails, and ALSO had it put to them that a husband attending SES would be nifty...it doesn't sound so bad. Could you direct me to the relevant posts?
It sounds JUST as bad to me Bella.
These posts have come up here and there. Here's some I found in one thread herehttp://www.whyaretheydead.net/phpBB ... c&start=60 but there have been others.
edit to ad: if the link isn't working it's page 5 of the thread called "just discovered this! From expupil of girls school"
This first is from the bottom of a long posts of Shouts - which actually alludes to another thread where the conversation first started.
-St.James School has usually tolerated sexual relations between male staff and 6th Form girls - throughout it's history.
-Additionally, for many years it used to be the policy of the Governors of St James to provide the girl pupils in it's care to male staff, using the format of balls and dinner-parties, for the purposes of sex and/or relationships; having groomed them from the age of 13, to prefer older men.
I think many of the posts about this aspect of the StJ girls school may have been from Shout - so do a search for Shout's posts via the memberlist. However he's not the only one to have claimed it and if you see Daska's post below Shout's (they are the last two on that page I gave you) she does tend to confirm the theory.
as does this from TS in page 3 of the same thread
Re: Grooming -yes- yuck! At 16 a dinner was organised with older men from the SES. I didnt get it immediatley even though there was an exact number of these weasels to match the girls, Someone asked why one man who we knew wasn't there and the answer as if it was obvious-'Hes married'. One girl got drunk and found herself in the back of a car ( consentually whilst very pissed) then I got asked out by this man in his 30's who was our chaperone in our school holiday in Italy.