My first experience of tackling sexist attitudes!

I work in a secondary school, and we are currently preparing for the year 11s to leave us for (hopefully) bigger and better futures. Part of the preparations involve the students nominating their peers for 'titles', for example, "Best personality" and "Most likely to be a millionaire". The nomination sheets were printed up and sitting in tutors trays ready to be handed out to the year 11 students.

It happened that I glanced at one in passing, the first I noticed being "Best figure". I actually had to check twice. I also spotted "Bitchiest" and "Most likely to end up in prison". I was so gobsmacked I went up stairs to reflect. Was this normal in schools? I have since found that apparently it is. Other schools have informed me that this has been a tradition in many schools for many years. I wondered whether I was being too sensitive.

Looking at the list in more detail (it is 3 pages long) I also found, "Sexiest student", "Most weird", "Most likely to work in McDonalds", "Most barbie dolled", "Most aggressive" and "Student who eats the most". There was also a teacher list which includes "Best looking teacher" and "Most boring teacher".

Obviously a lot of these are not feminist issues (the one that riled me the most on that score was "best figure", which to me means the biggest boobs) but I got so angry that students would be 'awarded' a certificate for these 'achievements' from a school.

I made my feelings explicitly clear to management, who did seem shocked, and the list was quickly ordered to be destroyed. It will be re-edited.

I am not naming and shaming my school as we all work very hard to make a difference to students with a variety of challenging needs. It appears that this is not unusual, and happens in many schools.

It is a shame that the awards, although can have humour (craziest hairstyle is an example of a humorous but kind title) they could be used to really promote pride and hope (or am I being old fashioned now?). Perhaps we have kids who hardly ever get told they could go on to achieve something, wouldn't an award of something inspiring mean something to them (even if they don't admit it!?). I can't imagine being the parent of the student who goes home with the certificate "Best Figure" or "Most likely to end up in prison"......