William Sutcliffe, a book author and father from Edinburgh, was stunned to find his daughter’s math textbook features sexist examples. Last Sunday, William took to Twitter to share what made him very concerned: “My daughter’s 'curriculum for excellence' maths homework (used throughout Scotland) features sums about women going on spa breaks and calculating weight loss; men buying bikes and doing sit-ups.”
His tweet blew up on social media, with many parents joining the thread to share what they thought of the Scottish textbook employing gender stereotypes. But William and his wife didn’t stop there.
Realizing what a wrong impression it could have on their daughter, they changed the names on the worksheet by swapping female and male characters. People online have praised the two, and since the internet is sometimes a magical place, William was happy to get a response from the publishing house who assured they’re working on updating the old content with adequate contexts.
The Edinburgh dad recently tweeted about a very concerning math textbook his daughter was working on for her homework
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
The textbook used sexist examples to calculate sums that left the parents appalled
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
But mom made a much-needed change and corrected the characters' names
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
The infamous textbook was published by Teejay publishing house, which proudly presents itself as “Scotland’s No. 1 Maths publisher, founded on 1st February 1994 by brothers Tom and John Strang.”
In a response to dad William, the publisher confirmed that this content is old and apologized for it being circulated. They promised to “ensure that the content is updated and the contexts in use are appropriate.”
However, this is not the first time that school books across the globe bear undeniable sexist examples as part of children's educational material. In fact, the problem is so widespread that in 2016, Unesco issued a policy paper analysis that warned against sexist attitudes and their damage in textbooks.
And this is the response from Teejay Maths publishing house that William received after his tweet blew up
Image credits: Teejay_Maths
Image credits: Will_Sutcliffe8
Such textbooks end up undermining the education of girls in a way that they limit their career and life expectations in profound ways, and according to Unesco, they represent a “hidden obstacle” to achieving gender equality. Meanwhile, Aaron Benavot, the former director of Unesco's 2016 Global Education Monitoring (GEM) report, said that “surveys show that females are overwhelmingly underrepresented in textbooks and curricula."
In many cases, the problem has three different layers. The textbooks employ traditional gender stereotypes that portray very wrong ideas about men and women, including traits and social expectations. Then, women characters are often left completely absent from the texts while male characters take the key roles.
And lastly, the use of gender-biased language, when male words fully replace female ones, is a very common occurrence in educational material for schoolchildren of various ages, social and cultural backgrounds.
People joined the thread to share their views on the situation
Image credits: Grant80Iam
Image credits: Bright_birds
Image credits: SammoisaPunkRkR
Image credits: SammoisaPunkRkR
Image credits: thekatywalker
Image credits: Natpaisey
Image credits: Helenhashim21
Image credits: SuzyT55596326
Image credits: IndependentScot
Image credits: fastestspider
Image credits: KerryMarriott42
Image credits: EmmaCeilidh1
Image credits: annettesjl
Image credits: ellabrand6