Sexual Harassment: High School Girls Speak Out

Darleen R. Golke is a high-school teacher-librarian in Winnipeg,
Manitoba.

According to one of the 25 female students aged 16 and older with whom
the author conducted in-depth interviews, sexual harassment “is
something that makes you feel uncomfortable about who you are because of
the sex you are.” Legal and scholarly definitions of sexual harassment
incorporate more complex language and ideas but essentially identify
part of the pattern of male-female interaction in which men express
dominance over women. Larkin, co-ordinator for the Women’s Sexual
Harassment Caucus at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education,
reports the results of a study conducted with students from four urban
and rural high schools.

Using quotations from interviews and excerpts from participants’
journals, Larkin discusses barriers to equal education; gender bias and
the struggle toward equal opportunity; the problem of sexual harassment
and examples of what constitutes harassment; the effects on young women
socially, educationally, and psychologically of sexual harassment; and
strategies for educating parents, administrators, teachers, young men
and young women about a very real problem in today’s schools and
society.

The comments from students and examples of harassment are often
graphically explicit. The topic of sexual harassment cannot, Larkin
believes, be explained in gentle, politically correct language if the
problem is to be fully understood. Drawing additionally on other recent
research that targets behavior often considered “boys will be boys”
teasing or typical adolescent interplay, this study warns that unless a
concentrated effort is launched beyond the usual choices among
tolerance, ineffective responses, and effective responses, females in
the school system will continue to be adversely affected by verbal and
physical harassment. The study makes for disturbing reading and might
leave the parent, educator, or student with the impression that sexual
harassment has reached epidemic proportions in Canadian schools. Larkin
draws attention to very real problems and offers solutions, among them
the AICE (access, inclusion, climate, empowerment) model of equal
opportunity. All stakeholders in the educational environment must be
alerted to the disturbing nature of harassment before we can hope to
achieve equal opportunities for all students, male or female.