A victory for common sense etc. After the education minister
had resisted the change for many months, girls in Northern Ireland schools are
finally being allowed to wear trousers. The change will start from the next
academic year.
It’s extraordinary that it’s taken so long to introduce a such a basic option, with politicians offering all sorts of dubious reasons for insisting on skirts.
I took part in the consultation on whether trousers should
be permitted, and of course I said that
trousers are more practical in a number of ways.
Apart from anything else it should cut down on unwanted male
attention, not just in school but outside.
Women’s clothes are subjected to constant comment, often
negative, while men’s clothes attract much less scrutiny.
It’s amusing to imagine a reverse situation in which men had
to wear skirts, and how angry they would get with any salacious reactions. They
would soon be lobbying for a change in the dress code.
Agreed. They should have been allowed to wear pants a long time ago.
ReplyDeleteMary: As Sean says below, girls in Canada wore jeans from the early 1960s. Northern Ireland is finally catching up!
DeleteI would guess that Northern Ireland has different sociology from what I am used to. In Canadian schools the girls had permission to wear blue jeans in, I think, the early 1960's. Jeans were universal when I hit middle school/junior high around 1970 when, come to think of it, some girls wore that new fashion for "hot pants."
ReplyDeleteIn the late 1970's, as an adult in the army, I got a big laugh when I had a novelty item: a plastic rainbow coloured hair comb, but I don't remember anybody being uncomfortable enough to disparage me. Gender differences didn't have as much staying power as I suppose they did in N.I.
Sean: Yes, Northern Ireland is way behind Canadian schools. A rainbow coloured hair comb, golly gosh!
DeleteIt's taken a while!
ReplyDeleteI left school in 1988 which is obviously a long time ago now. We weren't allowed to wear trousers then but it changed by the time my daughters were in school in 2003
Kylie: Northern Ireland has been way behind the times.
DeleteI was allowed to wear jeans to school in 1978 - and before that trousers were okay.
ReplyDeleteSkirts are horrible in winter.
Sx
Ms Scarlet: I've heard so many girls complaining about having to wear skirts in freezing temperatures.
DeleteThat's a long time coming!
ReplyDeleteIf Canadian schoolgirls could wear trousers in the early sixties, it's taken Northern Ireland around 60 years to be so enlightened!
DeleteCan you spell Canadian winter? Inland, on the prairies? The land is ice hard, the snow dry like powdered sugar. (Hence I like to escape to the UK during January, instead of the normal tourist season) Well, The first few Calgary female police constables, (you could count them on one hand) postwar, had to wear skirts. Argh! Today the firefighters, paramedics (ambulance) and police officers all wear thick dark trousers.
ReplyDeleteSean: Jenny has a cousin in Toronto so she gets plenty of updates about the Canadian weather. Policewomen in skirts - how impractical is that?
DeleteOh ya, I should add that I was a teenager in the Vancouver-Victoria area, near the ocean, where climate is like Britain.
ReplyDeleteWow! I thought Minnesota was backwards in not allowing girls to wear trousers during school until the late 1960s. Before that we could wear them under a skirt to school but had to remove them when we got there.
ReplyDeleteLinda
Linda: I have no idea why our politicians resisted the change for so long. I'm surprised there hasn't been a mass revolt by schoolgirls.
DeleteWow. I would never have imagined this. I don't remember being able to wear pants while in high school but that was a long time ago.
ReplyDeleteSandra: It's extraordinary isn't it? Why are the politicians so terrified of girls in trousers?
DeleteHard to imagine the girls were still required to wear dresses/skirts in this day and age.
ReplyDeleteColette: We have two schools nearby so we see girls in skirts all the time. The option of trousers is long overdue.
DeleteI will be 70 in October, so in the 70s I was a teenager. I do remember being able to wear pants in high school. In elementary school, all the girls were required to wear a gray tunic with a white blouse. (the colours would vary according to which school you attended). And the boys all wore pants, a white shirt and a tie.
ReplyDeleteOh, I live in Montreal, Canada.
ReplyDelete