Burnley Grammar School

Correction:
I meant to say 'Gross indecency', not 'misconduct'.

I'm a grammar schoolboy out of the swinging sixties, leaving school in 1968.

I enjoyed PE, but it was very dependant on who took you and for what. In the gym I remember three particular male teachers, two of them were marvellous, great fun, interested, sensible, caring, and all that. They were full of positive encouragement and always wrote good things up about many of us, even if we were not the greatest at something, they'd always find a way of saying something positive either verbally or in writing.

But that was two out of three. The other one was nothing like those two. It was one of those school gyms like many speak of and like the photograph illustrates, where boys turned out for PE in white shorts and no more, shirtless and without shoes or socks on, and the ever so strange no underpants rule. Only the shorts on. Which in practice didn't amount to a great big deal anyway with two of our gym teachers who made no big issue of the school rule on that and never much drew attention to it other than the occasional gentle reminder to one or two. But the third teacher went far further. Every time we had the third man for gym PE from the age of 11 plus we would line up obediently for him along the gym wall and he would start by ticking a register, which none of the others did, and then walk along and stretch open quite widely the elastic on our shorts and peer down into them to check we had not kept our pants on, in the process 'checking us all out' very closely and personally, at times almost touching us with the back of his fingers. He would then allow the elastic to snap back at the waist quickly. I think our PE gym had about 20 to 25 boys and he did the same to all of us. I remember he seemed to linger for that extra second too long while he did it. A quite humiliating situation. We knew he was going to do this every time we had him, even if he had seen clearly some of us not put our pants on under our shorts. Nobody ever did anyway, we knew the rule on that, so the checking was a complete waste of time.

I think there was a certain naivety about this when we were younger but as we got older it continued and by fourteen I remember rumours about him beginning to circulate privately among us, and if they did in our class then I'm sure they must have done in other classes around school too if he was doing the same with them, which is a good bet he was.

Then in the early 70's about five years after I'd left school I heard that a teacher from my grammar school had been caught and convicted of an act of gross misconduct in a public lavatory and fined £10. Everything began to make sense then and it made my skin crawl to think he was abusing a school rule to gain some sort of personal satisfaction over every single one of us in the PE gym class. But at the time that conviction did not result in his immediate dismissal from his job, that only came some time later so I was to hear, possibly another year or two. Where he went or what he did after that I have no idea, he wasn't an old teacher.

Since the internet became a thing and finding people became easier I've tried to find out if I can get any further information but without success, he had a rather common name, but although I left school in the late 60's I think he could still only be in his mid to late 80's right now if alive, certainly 90 tops.

When we showered, as we had to, he was the only PE teacher who watched us and sometimes joined us too, the others all let us get on with it and barely took any notice of us as long as they knew we'd gone in. He was even known to rub the backs of certain boys in the shower and massage their legs if they complained of muscle strain. Nobody else did this, if there was a problem you were given a time to go and see the school doctor, either immediately if urgent or later if not. That was the rulebook.

What I'm saying here is probably not even that unusual is it. Grammar school, boarding school, secondary school, many of us had great teachers with a more problematic character stuck in the mix among them.

My children have all been educated privately at the same school. One is currently a pupil aged fifteen. Under the physical education section of both the printed literature and the school online site the full provision is explained clearly and very directly, from this written verbatim - Male pupils do physical education (P.E) in bare chests in school gymnasium unless directed otherwise.
Further along, and placed in bold type - Showering is mandatory after ALL physical education (P.E) classes on the timetable.

I have no concerns whatsoever about such requirements, none.

Many things are now required on the P.E buy list, including shin pads and gum shields for instance, not just clothing items or types of boots and trainers.

It's a traditional school that has been in existence for a very long time and has an outstanding inspection report that could not be bettered. I know my children's confidence increased there and the attention to personal self discipline they give them is welcome.

Brian speaking for who knows how many there. I had a class clown actually pee onto my leg in the showers at school once. I kid thee not, a fellow boy in my PE class I showered with thought it would be a great giggle to open his sphincter and flow forth a steam of his urine onto my leg, to be met with much amusement. The point had apparently been that I wouldn't notice but others would, because of the running water already. How do you deal with somebody like that? Anyway I never thought I'd hear of anything similar and then six months ago came across a tiktokker called 'GenxJono' a middle aged guy at school in the eighties and he put a clip out saying boys peeing on others in the showers like this happened to others.

I also had a PE teacher who checked boys hair was wet enough when we exited the showers and he rubbed everyone's head to check, and brushed his hand fully across our shoulders too to make sure they were wet enough. He did it to every single one of us. What a thing to do when you've just stood looking in on us all with a clear view of 22 naked schoolboys anyway. Someone I was in school with described this as legalised paedophilia. It makes you wonder don't you think?

https://www.tiktok.com/@genxjono/video/7361449730435534111

Comment by: Alan on 13th December 2024 at 16:55


"I walk my dog in fields/woods near my house, every day without fail

There is a large grammar school near by, and I often see groups of boys doing cross country. They are all ages (from 11 to 18), and all the boys are always shirtless, wearing only shorts & trainers (other than maybe mid winter when some wear vests, not all)....."

This is another Alan of course, not me. I have to say that schools are probably living fifty years ago in the past, and grammar schools sixty. Why is the "Iron Man" attitude employed today when society as a whole has moved on. There is no need for this hairy chested machismo when those who want to indulge in sports of all types have good access to it outside, and the rest, thanks to Rachel From Accounts, will be lucky to find a part time job in Tesco or Poundland, They are not being prepared for military life, and some teachers need to take a look at the calendar and realise it is nearly 2025 and their old borstal methods are no ;longer appropriate. I wonder when music departments will reintroduce Plainsong, or lessons in how to play the harpsichord?.

A lot of the school syllabus is out of date, and to use a current cliche' "not fit for purpose". Teachers and education authorities really do need to take a leap into the real world of the 21st century, but they are generally a load of lazy administrators and pen-pushers. A pity they are not made to take their own lessons, in the same conditions as their pupils. It would change soon enough then.


Comment by: Brian Merch on 13th December 2024 at 16:57


"The boys’ communal shower in secondary school was essentially a private hunting reserve for bullies. Those of us who were scrawny or nerdy, had to be naked in the same room as our tormentors.

Bare chests in the gym hall, we were doing it constantly, and that was where the teacher became the tormentor about us if we looked or performed less than perfect. There was no hiding place."

This post is worth repeating in full because Brian is 100% right. I was scrawny not nerdy, but many of us in these categories know this is true, and the whole day would be ruined by knowing what was coming in the afternoon. Teachers knew it went on - some of them even joined in, in the changing room, to ingratiate themselves with some of the lads who they felt was a chip off the old block. It is a pity that the education secretary doesn't read posts like those on here, and started sorting out the many problems kids face every day, rather than faff about with her "teeth brushing lessons".

I attended Monmouth Comprehensive in the early 2000s. We were always limited to wearing white shorts only for gymnastics and most other indoor activities. Occasionally, the PE teachers even required us to strip to the waist outside. Out of curiosity, I looked up my former school's website on the Wayback Machine, and sure enough, it still listed the PE kit as: "Boys, gymnastics: white shorts."

It also mentioned that T-shirts were to be worn for other sports like badminton and athletics, but at least during activities in the gymnasium, we were only very rarely allowed to wear any top.

The boys’ communal shower in secondary school was essentially a private hunting reserve for bullies. Those of us who were scrawny or nerdy, had to be naked in the same room as our tormentors.

Bare chests in the gym hall, we were doing it constantly, and that was where the teacher became the tormentor about us if we looked or performed less than perfect. There was no hiding place.

I walk my dog in fields/woods near my house, every day without fail

There is a large grammar school near by, and I often see groups of boys doing cross country. They are all ages (from 11 to 18), and all the boys are always shirtless, wearing only shorts & trainers (other than maybe mid winter when some wear vests, not all).

One of my neighbours has 2 boys at the school, and told me that they all have one cross country run every week, as part of their PE lessons. This lesson ranges from a 2 mile run (young boys), up to 5 miles (older lads). and no tops are allowed ever, apart from a couple of mid winter runs, when a vest is optional

Matthew, the schooltype ages are approximately - infants 4 or 5 to 8, primary is 8 to 11 or 12, and secondary/comprehensive is 11 or 12 to 18.

Primary school is most definitely not aged 4, 5, 6 or 7, not as far as I've ever understood it.

Comment by: Liam on 11th December 2024 at 20:46
Danny C my brother reminds me of your comments further back, do you have any pictures or films your parents took of your sports days because my parents took one or two where everyone you can see on the school field who is a boy there is shirtless in the 1980's.




Quite a good question that has given me pause for thought. I do have one definite photo of my school sports day, a set piece class photo of me aged 13 with my class and some others, about 40 of us in total and none of us is wearing tops, we are all barechested, as we were evry sports day afternoon for a few hours in the company of a large amount of visiting families and others. I had other set piece photos taken in subsequent years but am not in possession of those. A couple of people did email me once and I did share the photo I do have of my own school sports day like that, only wearing shorts and trunks. Swimming was a part of our sports day as well as track and field and other bits and pieces. Our barechested PE lessons continued for sports day just the same, no tops allowed, nothing on our feet either, which I always found a bit strange even if we were on grass.

But good question about other photos. I'm not aware any of my family took any photos of my sports days at school like this, but cannot be sure. I always had at least one parent come to them, my mum, and even one grandparent a lot too, my nan during the 80's. I know the parents of some of my old school friends and they might have taken things. I know I saw people with cameras at these open sports day events in our school every first week of July. I also know that a local press guy was always taking lots of images, wherever they ended up.

Liam, thank you for your recollections of your and your brother's schooldays.

Don't mind my asking, but just out of interest, did you move to a slightly different area when you went from "first school" to "primary school"? How old were you when you made the transition?

I'm just a little puzzled, because "primary school" in the UK normally refers to a school covering the whole age range from 4 to 11. I went to an infant school from 4 to 7, then a junior school from 7 to 11 before going to secondary. I gather in other parts of the country, there were first schools and middle schools before secondary, with transitions taking place at different ages - sorry if this is over-complicated!

Bill.

I noticed you said the same thing this time last year. Do you think it's something to do with this time of year then, a special event or something rather than everyday normality there? December is quite an unusual time to see running like that. Comparing what you've seen to a few years ago with some of the older people here, we would have been made to do that but you just know they were unlikely to have been, that's why you saw some with shirts on obviously, that's how they felt best. I feel for those who got sent out like that when they didn't like it. I think some people like pushing their limits of endurance even if it means a bit of suffering, or cold, ice baths for instance. At least none of us at school were forced into sports ice baths in our time to aid our muscles after PE. I had a chance to try one once and looked at it and declined, my hand went numb when I stuck it in, I can't imagine my whole body in something like that.

There's a 10 year gap between me and my older brother, we both went to the same secondary school, he did from 1982 until 1988 and I did from 1992 to 1998. There is also a sister between us. When he went there in the 1980's the P.E took place shirtless all the while. One of the first memories I hold is being about 4 or 5 years old and going to watch him with my parents at sports day and seeing all the boys without much on up top. When I was that age, just 4 or 5 my mum often kept me shirtless all day long if it was nice conditions and so I got quite used to it. When I went to first school they did a lot of PE there in the 80's with boys and girls topless together, many just in pants, some in shorts, all barefoot. At the time I was doing that my brother was nearing the end of secondary. When I got up to secondary school myself by the 1990's I was always shirtless in the school gym, everyone was, and had to be. The options seemed to be very limited about what could be worn. The only difference was that I did wear a shirt for the sports day but some boys didn't, they let us choose that because of letting the public in on us all. My brother didn't get that. Danny C my brother reminds me of your comments further back, do you have any pictures or films your parents took of your sports days because my parents took one or two where everyone you can see on the school field who is a boy there is shirtless in the 1980's.

My primary school was very different. For three years there I never did any P.E shirtless, and we were always in gym looking very well dressed in matching red polo short sleeved tops, blue shorts, white socks pulled almost to the knees and trainers laced up. Always. It never changed. When I started primary school and did P.E like this I felt like I was overdressed, having come from a first school where it was done shirtless and barefoot. When I got up to secondary school I'd been used to staying dressed for P.E so had to get used to it all over again going shirtless and it took time to adjust to again but I think I was alright with it most of the time after a while. But ten years after my brother in the 1980's little had actually changed throughout the 1990's except not having to be shirtless when public were invited onto school grounds. One thing that hadn't changed was communal showering, I was using the same white tiled communal showers at school in the late 1990's as my brother had done in the early 1980's and they were compulosry to use with him then and with me later on and nobody was allowed to walk in with shorts on to hide their modesty, so we are both from the school 80's and 90's generation who were used to waving our tackle about with our mates after P.E, which was an education in itself come to think of it. My sister never had to shower at school if she didn't want to, so never did.

Bill, it's good to see lads running stripped to the waist. Due to where we live I run barechested the vast majority of the time. Recently and out of the blue. my eldest son (11) asked if he could remove his t-shirt and promptly stripped off. He coped with the conditions and the cold admirably I've told him it's down him if he wants to strip off to run he can. We'll see what Saturday morning brings.

Dropping in again to say I was sitting in my car between deliveries late this morning in Dunstable and saw a group of youngsters running from the same school I mentioned on here about a year ago doing the same thing. There were a group of about 20 of them and at least three quarters of them were shirtless with an older adult (teacher?). They looked about 16 or 17. On my dashboard at the time it said it was 7 degrees C and it was breezy out and about this morning at times with no sunlight. Who says modern kids are soft!

Lots of people had the old fire drill in PE moment. I suppose somebody has to during the school day. We were already outside when it went off and dressed accordingly, so no problems. I was always disappointed that we didn't start seeing flames licking from the roof of the maths block!

I think it was quite unusual in those days James to have a parent who would think shirtless in PE, even out like that, was crazy, certainly the dads anyway. I can imagine a few mums mollycoddling their sons over it though. Did he not drive by again to check, he must have known your timetable, I always had to give my parents my school timetable so they knew what I was doing and could check.

Humdinger, great nicknamed, no need to boast though. Good points made, never really thought of school PE like that. Typical philosophising teacher. Actually she's wrong, our parents paid for those PE lessons like everything else in the education budget.

Talking budgets, Gary Oliver on the cost of school renovations. What you've got to remember is that schools run on tight margins and frugal budgets so what might seem dirt cheap to a builder might not be to someone balancing the school books and the education budget in council locally. We know builders make a packet. I was quoted 8K for a minor brick pointing job last year on a small area. I didn't return the call after that!

Never seen the Good Health video beforew Paul, gosh that was in your face wasn't it. They didn't seem very bashful though did they. Perhaps they were keen to be seen on TV at any cost. I'd have a real gasp and mighty good laugh if I could see myself doing that nowadays with friends I'd long forgotten. I hope the cameraman was CPS checked or equivalent. He could have bootlegged some of that for others. Perhaps the kids all got a copy. I would have wanted one.

Gary Oliver - If you'd go nuclear about phones hanging about I wonder what you'd have done about this, posted previously.....

<Comment by: Paul J on 24th June 2022 at 14:59
I've just watched the Good Health video which I remember from years ago, I'm amazed it's still around.

https://youtu.be/NRRw-k7cGJs

One of the things that struck me immediately was that among the lads they were all of healthy size and more importantly weight for their age, there didn't seem to be an inch of fat to be seen.

Compare that to a similar group of lads coming out of school today and I'm pretty certain there would be a significant percentage of rather 'lardy' lads who would no doubt benefit greatly from the sort of PE classes the video shows and a generally more healthy life style.>






They had the full camera crew in their changing room filming a dozen or so from all angles getting out of PE kit, going in the showers, nothing on, head to toe, back and front, in and out, getting wet, soaping up, the lot of it, and drying and dressing. They had already shown a lot of shirtless mixed PE too. This wasn't even a secondary school but a middle school too. All shown on TV, perish the thought that was me being put out on daytime ITV like that back then. Their parents must have all agreed though you'd think.

When I was at secondary school so much PE was done without a top, skins for everyone male, and we had some decent bonding moments showering and checking each other out like you do, those who say they didn't are liars! I was fairly happy to do PE as most of the sports I didn’t mind. but as you near the end of secondary, you hit that phase where you want to get out of it and just chat with your mates. I remember a form tutor raising the amount of PE absences with the class once and a girl asked why they have to do PE. Her reply was brilliant. She said that when you're older you'll have to pay to participate in a class, join a gym or do a team sport. This is the one time it’s free and you get to do it with your mates. So make the most of it. Youth really is wasted on the young as she was completely right. What I'd do to be able to play football or cricket with mates twice a week for free now, I'd even happily do it skins again and share the showers with my fellow 52 year olds (ignoring the physical pain it would cause)!

(Humdinger was a school nickname a PE teacher called me for being a good all rounder at everything, and on my name, which the boys took up with another meaning about my size, if you know what I mean - no secrets in the school showers were there, haha, better than the boy we called Pinhead anyway, poor guy)

I remember my father going crazy as I had to run a cross country shirtless with the rest of the PE form in the early 80s down a public road when I was only 13/14 years old, sometime around 1981/2. We did this rather a lot actually, gym was already a complete bare chest skins only environment anyway, want to wear a top, forget that idea, so they just extended it to outside running too, but my father was driving this public B road in his dark green Austin Princess and went right past us and saw me doing this. I didn't even notice him until he got in later and told me, and he told me he thought the teacher was making a spectacle of us. He also mentioned the dangerous way we were running, on the left with the traffic flow rather than on the far right facing the traffic where we could be seen easier by oncoming vehicles. It wasn't a terribly busy road though. He insisted I told the teacher how to run safely, which I did and we changed that bit. The PE teacher was taking us out cross country running without knowing basic road safety, and we counted as pedetrians. As for the shirtless part, we kept doing that until a parents evening soon after and my father mentioned it, only because we were doing it in a dnagerous place and in public. My father thought my cross country PE teacher was arrogant because he didn't like being told things. We carried on just the same though, the little chat made no difference. It's hard to tell how many people I shared PE with actually liked or disliked doing the cross country in that way on the road, or bare chest gym in general. I neither loved nor unloved it, it was just what we did, but my father found it crazy.

Comment by: Woody on 3rd May 2023 at 18:43
PE at the secondary school I attended was shirtless for gym every Monday straight after lunch, and as I liked my food and filled my face in the school canteen I was often doing PE on a very full stomach and felt it noticed to look at because we had our shirts off and a teacher once made a "too many chips" quip at me. I was average weight, not fat. We were not allowed to put tops on in that lesson. I think I began eating a lot less on Monday's just so I was doing PE on less of a full stomach.

In the same lesson someone smacked a ball against the wall, nothing unusual in that, except it hit the fire alarm box and cracked the glass setting it off and sending us all outside only ten minutes into the lesson. A couple of teachers lent one or two their coats to cover and warm up while the rest of us just braved it and shivered until we got back inside.





Just had to pick out this old post from last year by Woody and the second paragraph, hope you're still reading Woody mate because this same thing happened to me towards the end of the 1970's. I was in the fourth years then, ages fourteen and fifteen. Like endless other boys at the time who took PE in regular compehensive schools our lessons were taken bare chested in the school sports hall which had two fire alarms, one either end. There was only one way in and out of the building via normal route, and a designated fire door. You could not get to the boys changing area without leaving one block and entering another, and the rule in a fire drill was once you left a school block you must never go in through another even as a short cut.

Congregating ready to start PE in the morning, the whole lot of us in class were there waiting around the sports hall bare chested as normal while the teacher had buggered off to his office for something quickly, and there was a ball getting thrown about that very nearly hit the fire alarm. Some twerp suggested a dare to break the glass because someone else had just suggested how crap it would be if we had to leave the lesson as we were without our tops on. This twerp said shall we find out and smashed the ball with almight force and broke the glass - ALARM RINGS - teacher runs back through into us and notices the glass, asks who did it, nobody answers except to say the ball accidentally smacked into it and we were all sent out through the fire door to assemble just as were were, thirty bare chested lads sent out onto a windswept all weather pitch assembly point. It was a poor day outside.

Our PE teacher told the head that someone in our group had broken the sports hall fire bell and set it off, so he kept all our PE group out there after everyone else in school had gone back in and demanded to know the culprit before anyone was allowed to move back into the building. A few people said it was an accident and couldn't be sure who actually threw the offending ball and the head told us no ball could possibly break the glass unless it was deliberately thrown at it with force at close range. Which we had done. Nobody owned up. Nearly the entire hour lesson time had been used up by the end of all this and when we did go back in we were quite fresh and our PE teacher decided to try one last time to get the culprit and when he failed he made the entire class of 30 lads take a freezing cold shower and stay in it until he told us we could get back out.

The twerp that caused all this got his answer, and of course nobody dobbed him in, we all missed a lesson, got humiliated outside at the fire assembly point, a dressing down from the head and our teacher and a cold shower to top it off. It really wasn't worth it.

I attended a Catholic school in Northern Ireland from 1987-1992.
The school was built in the late 1950's. It was designed for half the students it had in the late 80's. Class sizes were much larger and the communal showers simply where no longer fit for purpose. Yet they squeezed us into them anyway.

I was the 'sporty type', and had no issues with the situation.
However I remember one of my classmates who would shield his genitals every time on the walk from the benches to the shower and back again.
Those showers must have been a nightmare for him.
I own a construction company now. The argument that cubicles cost too much is nonsense.
Forced communal showers for children should not be happening in 2024, period.
If the school isn't prepared to spend the money on cubicles then shorts should be opitonal.
If it was my child being forced to expose themselves in the age of camera phones, and the internet, I would go nuclear.

School showers never went away, they've always been a part of the usual set up in upper schools across the country. It's only a question of which schools have continued to use them. It depends who you've got running your school actually. Men or women could make a difference too, but that's not knowledge, just a guess based on what I think I know. Like Roger, I am also a governor of a state academy in the west midlands. Our school has a head teacher who was once a physical education teacher for a time in his early career, and our school set rulebook requires showering to be done on completion of PE. As far as I know there haven't been any big issues over this being the case, and these are done in the expected way, my own three children were at the school over the last 18 years and took them, mentioned the fact they did this to us but expressed no obvious discomfort over it the rule. Two are boys, one a girl. All are quite sports mad so this may explain it a bit, it seems the less active or unsporty types tend to complain about such things disproportionately.

Showers are open plan, communal type. Separate cubicle areas are simply too expensive for most schools, they always have been. They do not meet the cost and efficiency threshold I'm afraid. Communal showering has always been the cheaper option and most time efficient way of dealing with the freshening up of a large group of people in a short amount of time such as in a school. Generally speaking if you want private then you have to pay for a health club membership, and even if many schools could provide such cubicle areas they would not be as private as you might think.

I remember when I was at upper school in the mid seventies my school wouldn't let anybody out the changing room who hadn't been in the showers after PE. The one surefire thing to make a PE teacher very angry and annoyed with you was trying not to go in the showers. You soon learned not to try that one on them. We always had a couple of PE teachers in the changing room and one would be standing in the shower area watching everybody and what they were up to and another would be pacing the changing room up and down making sure every last one of us was getting our PE kit full off and heading for the shower and not just getting dressed again in school uniform. They were really strict about this and down on you about it. There was banter and larking about but nothing that I would call bullying and I don't think anyone made anyone else feel inadequate about themselves, whatever shape or size they were while we shared the showers together.

I'd like to also agree with the response Roger gave to the lady concerned about her youngest child. I don't think going nuclear over the situation is the best way forward, that could cause more damage than is needed to be. As you have an older child who is unconcerned by the new rule, try and get him to reassure his younger brother. Like Roger has said, and I agree, just see how things go. Let the young child face up to the new rule and see how he fares with it for a short time. If it remains a big problem after that then you can be in a stronger position I feel. Yes, I know he doesn't want to take a shower or to be seen naked by his friends but I think he should at least confront this a few times first if that is the requirement and see if he really does feel the same after actually doing it. I think you may find he suddenly no longer mentions it. If however he does feel just the same and keeps mentioning it or feels even more unhappy then proceed with the measures you outlined.

One final thing on wearing shorts in the shower that got mentioned by Una. I do not understand this at all. If you wear shorts in the shower to hide parts of yourself, they get wet through, so you still have to remove them and put something dry on, therefore end up with nothing on during the process, so what is the point, and you are then left with wet through clothing to carry about. That's nonsensical to me and shouldn't be encouraged.

Comment by: Una on 5th December 2024 at 14:41

I agree with Roger, Una - complain about the schools decision. The old excuse (or one of them) for compulsory showers was that boys sweat. Not at eleven most of them don't.

You could also contact your local newspaper - they won't name you as a minor is involved, and y0ou could write to the current Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson, though she seems to be as away with the fairies as our Chancellor "economist" and the Minister for the Environment.

Schools seemed to lose their dictatorial image for a few years, but seemingly want to regain it You have to wonder why. I guess they just like the feeling of "power" in their otherwise nondescript lives.

Our headmaster was against the cane but approved cold showers instead. You wore shorts, arms were outstretched and stood under nozzle. Thee head behind was angled to soak your back. There was no escape until the water was turned off. Bare chests in the gym were mandatory. We also had two outdoor sessions a week where for team games half the class would remove their PE vests to go bare chests and very often the teachers would tell the whole class to strip off. Cross country were mandatory with bare chests preferred over the thin vests, Lads running laps of the field without vests was a daily spectacle

This is all getting a bit heavy going isn't it.

Er, anyway. Shirtless PE. I was never the most enthused at the prospect but had done a little bit when I was around 8 or 9 in primary school and got along just fine with it. I knew I might be in for much more of it however when comprehensive school came along after our primary class made a visitation to the comprehensive to find out about it. We were getting a guided tour by a teacher there, I think she was the head of languages, she later taught me French and were allowed to walk past the gym and all look in the large clear windows from outside where I saw a lesson in progress and all the boys were shirtless doing something or other. That hit me at once. Nobody mentioned it I don't think. I remember it made me nervous just seeing that, even though at primary I'd done some. But I felt different in the comprehsive school setting and a year or two older and was surprised how anxious this made me. When we got our notes for the new comprehensive I made for the PE kit we had to bring to school and it only said trainers and shorts for gym, no mention of a shirt top of any kind. So that was clear then, and I was right. Boys didn't do shirt tops in the school gym. I remember seeing boys at school turn up without any PE kit at all hoping to get off PE and all they got was a trip to lost property to pick some shorts and even lent a spare teacher towel for afters showers. Therefore I always think they did shirtless to make it hard for PE excuses, after all you can't forget to bring your skin can you, and if you didn't bring your trainers then you went with nothing on your feet and only had yourself to blame.

I know some people talk of communal showers at school being a prime place for bullies to thrive, well I think my school was averagely so regards bullies around the place, there were a few rough kids I avoided but I can truthfully say that communal showers at my comprehensive were totally free of such behaviour and I never saw anything close to trouble with anyone, we all just stripped off, no shorts on, hanging out and got on with it, no nonsense at all. We had no choice, all in the same boats so just got our heads down and did it as told, and soon got very used to it.

If you want my advice for the young chap who's worried I'd suggest not making a big deal of it all, let him face up to the school showers if that's what they are saying, and only if he is still acting the same after about a month when he's actually done it for real then act on it. He might just surprise himself and you and end up relieved that it lessens the fear by just doing it. It did with most of us I think.

Una.

School governor here.

Not everything you probably want to hear but I'll give it a go.

Unfortunately from your viewpoint it is perfectly legal because it's a school policy. The school can enforce more or less any rules it likes and sanction non complience as it sees fit. If they say your son has to take a shower and they punish him with a detention for refusing, there isn't a thing you can do to stop that. You can tell your son to refuse to attend the detention, but he will then get an escalating sanction for that as you've said. Schools are always doing this nowadays a bit like parking fines escalating if you don't pay, a modern day curse.

However, it is a frankly bizarre decision by the school to do this. It's a ludicrous hill for them to die on and is rightly going to cause an enormous amount of consternation with some parents, probably not just you. So, from a school parent governor perspective, here is how to make this such a pain in the backside for them that they will likely reverse this strange decision.

First of all, a formal complaint to the head teacher and the chair of governors. The school complaints policy will be buried somewhere on their website (this usually isn't deliberate, it's just a bit of an afterthought) but essentially it is an email in which you say you are making a formal complaint. Make sure this goes to the chair of governors as well as a formal complaint. Don't feel you need to tell any teachers about this, you don't.

In your complaint, cite the inappropriateness of mandating this extent of class pupil hygiene; that pupils in the class are presumably exxpected to be naked in front of each other with no privacy or cubicals, when any local gym or sports facility would provide these. Point out that not only has this never been necessary previously in the school's existence (if true?), but it is not deemed necessary in the many schools across the country nowadays, although it has been in the past (certainly in my school in the 70s everyone had to use the communal showers). Point out that you and the majority of other parents regard "gender and non-age segregated" as wholly inadequate in terms of privacy. Demand to know how the school intend to safeguard against pictures or videos being taken in the communal shower, regardless of whether phones are allowed or not.

Demand that if this is to be enforced that the school provide individual shower cubicals for privacy and demand to know when these will be installed. A long shot I know, but it puts them on the spot. You wouldn't expect top get the cubicles if none are available already. Cite the inappropriateness for children with SEN and sensory needs of communal showers, alongside those at different levels of puberty development who are sensitive about their bodies. Cite the inevitable increase in bullying that will result from children at different stages of development being forced to be naked in front of each other. Demand to know the educational benefit of this and who took the decision.

In this email, make it clear that if these cubicals are not provided or this policy is not reversed, your next complaint will be to Ofsted. Christine might be able to provide more assistance there. Trust me, nothing will cause more panic than that threat. Ofsted are really, really big on provision for SEND students, even if yours are not, that's bullying and safeguarding at the moment, so if you go big on these points it will make them worry about a surprise one day inspection. In reality your letter to Ofsted will probably do nothing, they approve of school showering provision being available generally speaking, but if a bunch of you all do the same thing (or threaten to), citing the same thing it may lead to an Ofsted call to the head, and no one wants that. So if there is a parents group where you can get a bunch to agree to the same tactic if the school refuse to acknowledge you, that's better.

You can also state that your son will not be attending any detention from refusal to shower and nor any subsequent punishment for refusal. That leaves the school in a quandary, all they can do is temporarily exclude your child at worst, which they won't want to do for a year 7 simply because he doesn't want to be naked in front of others. I can't imagine school wanting bad publicity for punishing children with detentions all over insisting your year 7 must be naked with others if he really is shy, fearful or even frightened by this, and many get anxious over this type of thing, I remember well. So not a good look to start forcing groups of naked showering against very unwilling pupils backed up with detention threats like this, and even worse if carried out in practice.

If that happened then finally, you can go to (or threaten to go to) your MP. They have no power over the school but you can ask them for support and to write to the head. Your MP will be able to write a pretty mean letter. Heads may well need their local MP from time to time so would be reluctant to get into conflict with them.

Hope this helps. I can usually see the reasoning behind fellow schools decisions but this one baffles me. I would be even more angry as a parent than you are if this was being imposed on my daughter. The key is making it such a pain that it's not worth it for them, and trying to act before this becomes the norm and generally accepted by pupils and other parents.

Of course if there are those who wish to take up the offer on a non mandatory basis such as your eldest then they should also be free to shower as much as they wish after PE lessons, there is no reason to stop this. You haven't mentioned any other parents speaking out like you so I imagine you feel on your own about it. Try and find out if you are really alone in the way you think or if your own youngest in year 7 is really the only one bothered. Does he have many friends you could talk to or their own parents for instance.

My own view after all this settles down is that the school will probably remain intransigent but that your son will not have to do this if he doesn't wish to. Plenty of schools still operate showering policies, even mandatory ones but in practice even in those if you kick up a big enough fuss I doubt it will be quite as mandatory after all. The trouble is that most children and their parents even nowadays don't rock the boat even over things they might disagree with incase it affects their child's education adversely. Whatever you do keep calm and reassuring. If he is able to opt out he might yet get a bit older and just wish to do so if he sees others doing this. Don't presume just because he is saying these things now in year 7 that he will feel the same in a year from now.

Good luck.

Comment by: Yours Truly on 5th December 2024 at 14:44
I remember That'l Teach 'Em, it must be fully 20 years since it was broadcast. I think you are referring to the second series which recreated life in a 1950s-style secondary modern school.
I was not aware that schools used cold showers as a disciplinary method although there is an instance of one early on in that tedious, over-rated film If.



Yours Truly - there was a cold shower taken in that show by someone for insolence or bad attitude, something like that, it was previouly discussed here. I remember both the show and the earlier chat here quite well.

Hi Christine,

I remember That'l Teach 'Em, it must be fully 20 years since it was broadcast. I think you are referring to the second series which recreated life in a 1950s-style secondary modern school.

I was not aware that schools used cold showers as a disciplinary method although there is an instance of one early on in that tedious, over-rated film If.

There were two boys who were subjected to the cold shower regime. At the time I assumed it was a cold shower because they couldn't actually cane anybody in the twenty-first century. I remember there was also a girl who was very badly behaved because she refused to accept the rigid discipline. The worst sanction she received was to be sent to see the headmaster, who sought to gently reason with her. It didn't work and she walked out of the programme at the end of the first day. Seemingly the two boys didn't merit any gentle reasoning. The gender discrimination was quite plain. I would be curious to know whether an element of discrimination was deliberately introduced into the programme because such practices were universally accepted as the proper way to do things in the 190s and '60s, or whether it was simply how the actor playing the headmaster thought himself in the present day.

I also remember another scene whoch definitely did reflect the gender mores of that time. There was a lesson for which the boys and girls and boys were divided and underwent different activities. For the girls this meant something which I think was called something like 'comportment', which basically meant instruction in how to act like ladies. For the boys, however it meant drill training, the 1950s after all being the era of military service. I remember that there was one particular boy who reacted violently against being treated like a conscript and walked off in a fury. The actor playing the sergeant major went after him and screamed into his face.

All this while the girls got to have a good giggle indoors.

Hello everyone,

This past Wednesday the school sent out an email saying that starting from the Spring term (after Christmas Holiday) all pupils who participate in PE will be required to use the showering facilities afterwards. They said 'adequate' time will be provided for the pupils to do this and that they advise us to pack our children with a towel and roll-on deodorant on days they have PE. It also said pupils who refuse will be issued with a maximum of an hour long afterschool detention.

My older son couldn't care less. But my younger son is 11, and in Year 7. He's a very timid boy, he has struggled massively with the transition from Primary to Secondary and has very few friends. He has literally never had a detention or any of the "behaviour marks". Some of the older boys in his school are these huge hulking teenage looking boys, one boy even has a full beard, but if you looked at my son you wouldn't guess he was older than 9 or 10 and it has really worried him. Sometimes the older boys share PE with younger ones, something I never did.

The email got sent to both my email and their (both boys) school emails, which my youngest checks regularly, since reading he has gotten very anxious about this. He's told me that the showers were always available but no one ever used them as they were essentially communal showers. Which he does not want to use. Which I can understand. Back when I was in school, this was still quite common. But children today don't have the same mentality for this.

I've been researching online and I can't find anything that says it's illegal for schools to mandate this, but I did find some legislation that says school showers must have 'adequate privacy'. And so I emailed the school asking how they will ensure 'adequate privacy' for the children. And they emailed me back a generic email stating something along the lines of 'adequate privacy will be provided for all pupils as shower rooms will be gender but not age segregated'. I emailed if shorts would be allowed but the response was just generic 'all items should be removed fully'.

But that doesn't feel good enough for me. I'm wondering why this is happening and now.

Listen, if it was just my older son at this school I probably wouldn't be causing trouble as he genuinely seems to not care about this. He's told me to stop making a noise about it because it's not important to him and no big deal. But it has clearly made my younger son very anxious for school after the Christmas Holidays. I know for a fact he will be too timid to refuse a 'direct instruction' by a teacher, especially now he thinks he can get a detention for it, which I think is harsh.

I need to know if this is legal and if there's any pushback I can give to the school?


I've had comments from a friend saying that I should refuse the punishment, unfortunately you can't do that. If your child does not attend an afterschool detention it simply continues to escalate, with in school seclusion and then full seclusion. Which would be outright awful for my son.

The friend told me that I should ask how they will ensure safeguarding around phones and other things while pupils are using the facilities. But apart from that it seems there's not much I can do, apart from move him schools which I won't do of course. I just think the boys need privacy. I would have no issue with them being required to shower if they really needed to and the younger one felt the same as the older one, or if there were sectioned shower areas rather than communal or they would let those who wish to do so wear some shorts. When I emailed back I questioned why they are doing this now, straight after Christmas in the middle of winter at the start of what they laughably call the Spring term.

I will be contacting the school again regarding his worries and concerns. And in the meantime, I suppose I will prepare my youngest one as best possible for whatever potential situation he will find himself in.

Any further advice I can get hold of would be welcomed. I found this while searching for online advice on the situation and how to approach it for the best. Thank you everyone.

Does anybody recognise this type of behaviour from their schooldays?

This anti-bullying film represents a situation that happened to me once because I was a quiet lad who was good at sport and attracted jealousy. I had my entire school uniform thrown under a running shower down the swimming baths once but the culprit got away with it. The same thing happened a second time in school after PE and he was finally caught with his sidekick lackey. I did not shake hands and make up and forgive them. That was just a bit unrealistic.

https://youtu.be/QKJFiAmx0cw?si=HkF9QrIpDAJ_D43O