Speaking up, speaking out

Students and faculty team up to address sexist

explaining a concept on the board only for a male student to explain it again.

“He said the exact same thing as I had. My stomach just dropped,” Hazel recalled. “It was humiliating.”

As word of Krishnan and Chau’s listening group began to spread from STEM to humanities students, Krishnan realized “the boys club”—a male-centric group culture that can give rise to sexism—is something that can “permeate all historically male-dominated academic activities”—even in extracurricular activities, like the chess club.

“A lot of clubs with female and nonbinary representation in leadership positions had the students step down because they’ve had to deal with sexism without much support,” Krishnan said. “Or they’re only signing up for classes where there’s already non-male representation within those classrooms, where they feel that they have the space to speak up and the agency to make changes.”

When chess club membership boomed after the release of the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit in 2020—whose protagonist was a female chess protégé—female and non-binary student attendance dwindled from nearly 10 in a room of 20 players to none.

Chess club co-lead Ilarion K. ’24 noted that due to the sudden influx of new players, the more experienced—and mostly male—members dominated the space.

Carina expressed gratitude for the attempts made by male students to respond to sexism, acknowledging that sexism cannot be solved without male support.

“This is a problem that we need to all be working on together to make a real difference in [non-male] students’ lives,” Carina said.

When concerns have been raised or issues shared, female students have found support and action from their peers and teachers. Another activity where students sought out leadership response to microaggressions was the parliamentary debate team. In November, nonmale debaters reported a “severe influx” of sexist behaviors within the team, according to head coach Sam Timinsky.

“As soon as this was brought to my attention, it became a top-priority issue,” Timinsky said. “Especially in a space that’s defined by rhetoric, exclusionary words have a huge impact.”

Riyana, a student leader on the team, noticed such behaviors manifesting in the form of mansplaining, a condescending or patronizing explanation by men directed at non-males.

“When I’m teaching younger debaters, older boys will sometimes interrupt me to teach the lesson,” Riyana said. “Only, they’re just repeating or reinforcing the same points I’m making.” this if it means presenting a play to the student body.’ The proposed were shut down and were aware they were letting assume responsibility for the girls felt the male students the adaptation.”

Talia B. ’26, a female member on the team, recalled when an older male debater “unsolicitedly and preemptively” explained neoliberalism to her, despite her familiarity with the concept.

What Riyana and Talia relayed is one of the most commonly invoked experiences by women who are considered experts in their field. Notably, author Rebecca Solnit used an experience of being mansplained in her own text and research as the inspiration for her essay collection, Men Explain Things to Me, where she recalled a man re-explaining her own book to her at a party. Solnit’s friend had to interject, “That’s her book” three or four times before the man took it in.

Like Solnit’s friend at that party, Riyana has tried to speak up and offer support to the female and non-binary students who experience mansplaining or other microaggressions.

When everyone gathered classroom, Kellough initiated reflecting on what had occurred more balance to the performance.

“Hopefully it was meaningful and especially the girls because important for their voices to said.

Especially in classes with (Kellough’s current English to female ratio of 10:3), Kellough subtle microaggressions towards students—including less class attentive listening when a non-male presenting.

“It’s really disheartening,” instance last spring, I felt like students to a certain degree. moment it happened and let forward. As a teacher, just calling being afraid to have those difficult is so important.”

The class that Kellough sexism in was made up of cis but while both female and nonbinary experience sexism, the experiences students differ from those of peers.

For many nonbinary individuals, perception—not their actual how other people treat them.

“People read me as feminine how I’m treated,” Jay said. “It my pronouns are they/he, it see me. There’s an expectation competent, especially in STEM

For Luki D. ’25, a member fabrication subteam, the concept STEM is not all-inclusive either.

“It’s an environment that’s more conducive to toxic bro-y behavior,” Ilarion said. “It’s easier to mansplain.”

In November 2022, a female member of the club confided in Ilarion that she felt frequently condescended to. He sent out an email to all club members including a form surveying discomfort and paths to improvement. The form only received three responses.

Due to the minimal response, Ilarion is skeptical as to whether there has been change and continues to re-examine what he can do as a club leader.

“There was a period of time after the email when things got a bit better, but people always go back to it,” Ilarion said. “[Co-lead Adam A. ’24] and I are still trying, but—not to try and shift away the blame or anything—we haven’t figured out how to solve such an ingrained problem.”

“I struggled and still struggle with self-worth in debate because the activity so heavily fuels the boys’ club culture, so I hope our younger gender minority debaters are able to find solace and support in their older non-male debaters to build resilience against misogyny,” Riyana said. “It’s so profoundly important that we remind our younger debaters of just how intelligent, competent, and worthy they are!”

While sexism within debate was brought to adult attention through students, teachers have also noticed subtle signs of male students dominating work spaces.

Upper school English teacher Gretchen Kellough was walking around the WRC and checking in with the students in her senior English class last spring when she came to a table with all the female students sitting idle while their male peers animatedly rehearsed a Shakespeare adaptation just a few feet away.

“It was only a week before performances, [the students] were doing the run through, and all the primary roles were played by men,” Kellough recalled. “I went over to the girl students and was like, ‘What happened? I would rather not perform

“Ever since I’ve realized more complicated,” Luki said. spaces create a binary definition a guy in STEM’ or ‘you’re a Because sometimes I'm perceived somehow I'm part of both. weird middle zone.”

II. TRANSFORMING EXPERIENCES

For some students, their discussions in the affinity group their own initiatives.

In robotics, inclusion officer hosting monthly meetings for members to share team experiences support to one another.

“I’m so glad this now exists way to build community and with others who have faced with sexism,” robotics co-captain said. “I hope this group continues a space where non-cis-males

At the end of February, Carina, Anahita A. ’23, who co-leads stood in front of 70 faculty weekly faculty meeting held a gender unbalanced

The ideas they had and while the girls letting the boy students the performance, the had taken control of gathered back in the initiated conversation occurred and how to add performance. meaningful for the students because we know it’s to be heard,” Kellough with a gender imbalance

12 class has a male Kellough has noticed towards non-cis-male class engagement and non-male student is disheartening,” she said. “In that like I failed the female degree. I didn’t catch it the let the boys march calling it out and not difficult conversations cited witnessing cis males and females, nonbinary students experiences of nonbinary of their cis female individuals, gender actual gender—impacts them. feminine and that impacts

“It doesn’t matter if it matters how they expectation that I’m not as STEM spaces.” member of the robotics concept of women in either.

I’m trans, it’s become said. “These [affinity] definition of either ‘you’re woman in STEM.’ perceived as a guy, Often, I’m left in this

Experiences Into Action

experiences and group have sparked officer Carly B. ’25 began for non-cis-male experiences and offer exists as it’s been a great and share experiences similar challenges co-captain Ciara D. ’24 continues to grow and be non-cis-males can come together.”

Carina, Lucie, and co-leads Feminism Club, members at the held in the Writing and

The numbers below are from an ongoing data science project by Lucie L. ‘23 to "gauge the climate" of sexism on campus.

To do so, Lucie sent out a schoolwide Likert-scale questionnaire last May asking participants five sets of questions, including “How often do you THINK a male student interrupts a non-male student at Nueva?” and “How often do you SEE a male student interrupt a non-male student at Nueva?” This format allowed Lucie to isolate perception, witness, and experience from each other.

“I wanted to apply the tools I was learning [in my data science class] to the challenges I was facing on campus,” she said. “It’s hard to tangibly map sexism, misogyny, and patriarchal microaggressions to experiences on campus…the main point of my project was taking anecdotes that we had and translating them into a data-backed picture that the school could work with.”

34% of non-male respondents see mansplaining happening "very frequently" at Nueva.

3.8% of male respondents see mansplaining happening "very frequently" at Nueva.

32% of non-male respondents see mansplaining happening "frequently" at Nueva.

23% of male respondents see mansplaining happening "frequently" at Nueva.

16% of non-male respondents see mansplaining happening "infrequently" at Nueva.

42% of male respondents see mansplaining happening "infrequently" at Nueva.

Research Center. They shared three anonymized accounts of gender bias students have faced over the past few months and asked teachers to reflect and discuss how they would handle the presented situations.

For Lucie, what was most important was just starting the conversation—especially from a team of students and faculty who are passionate about understanding the issue’s nuance and complexity.

“Teachers are the caretakers who facilitate the classroom and space, so the natural step forward was to start a conversation with them,” Lucie said. “This was a good turning point because while we had done a lot of this work within our team [of students], we hadn’t yet shared it with teachers in a reflective space.”

The positive feedback they received from teachers after the meeting was “heartwarming” and “gratifying,” according to Carina and Anahita.

“Non-male teachers told us the scenarios we presented happen even among teachers, and male teachers came up to us and said, ‘Thanks for that. I saw a couple of those scenarios happen in my classrooms and didn’t think too much of them at the time,’” Anahita recalled.

For Anahita and Carina, the faculty meeting developed into a conversation about opportunities for student-led change.

“It turned into a brainstorming session on, ‘If there was one way we could do anything to change that, what would it be?’” Anahita recalled. “One of the ideas that came up was formalized education about [sexism at Nueva], and the perfect place for that is Science of Mind (SoM).”

Starting mid-April for ninth and tenth-grade SoM classes, these student-led lessons—designed and taught by Anahita and Carina—educate students about microaggressions using Nuevaspecific examples.

“This is an opportunity for them to see that upperclassmen are talking about this and for us to go in and say, ‘We’ve experienced this too. Let us tell you about the resources available to you,’” said Carina, who hopes to impart a message of solidarity.

After months of iterations with the help of the SoM team Coordinator of Social Justice and Equity Matthew Oakland, the two are finally ready to present.

“One challenge was making sure we’re starting a productive discussion as opposed to making it a venting session. While venting allows people to get their emotions out and feel recognized, [action] is the most beneficial next step,” Anahita said.

The curriculum was piloted on the debate team, when, in response to the reported instances of misogyny, Timinsky contacted Oakland to set up a series of five mandatory “equity meetings” for the male members.

“What do you think is going on? What do you think the issues are?” Oakland asked the male debaters in the first meeting. What he quickly realized was that the men wanted a “single pariah.”

“They wanted to point to a certain moment or debater and say that was the issue,” Oakland recalled. As the discussions continued, however, there was an “organic realization” that the harm is not confined to a singular instance, but rather a culmination of smaller microaggressions.

“It was stuff like, hey, maybe when seven boys are standing in a circle chatting really loudly, a non-male student might not feel comfortable joining in,” Oakland said.

The group then simulated instances of gender bias using a modified version of Carina and Anahita's SoM curriculum, but with debatespecific scenarios written by non-male team members.

The main takeaway? Intervening in sexist behavior.

To Oakland, bystanding signals that “the person who got harmed isn’t as important as saving face.” He presented a series of responses to shut down sexist behaviors without escalating the situation, including phrases such as, “Hey, why did you just say that?”, “What did you mean by that?”, and more specifically for debate, “Why are you saying this debater is not as able to lead this session?”

Each meeting sported full attendance, according to Timinsky.

“The hope is that if [the male students] show up, if they’re even exposed to this kind of [gender bias] training, they’ll become more aware [of their actions],” he said.

For Syon P. ’24, a male debater, the meetings reminded him to reflect upon how others’ experiences can be shaped by what he thought were harmless comments.

“Because we aren’t at the receiving end of gendered microaggressions, [male debaters] throw around comments that we aren’t aware are deeply harmful,” Syon said.

He explained that through activities hosted in the meetings, the boys have “put themselves into non-male debaters’ shoes” and re-examined their own behavior patterns.

Riyana believes the sessions have made it easier to shut down mansplaining and other misogynistic behaviors.

“Healing from any kind of pain that’s been caused is a long process and requires constant work, but I’m glad the team has embarked on that journey,” Riyana said.

For Dean of Students Jackee Bruno, accountability and “a true desire for change” is the most important factor in approaching microaggressions on campus.

“Even if it’s a small action of adding words to a list of things you cannot say, we can improve on making a genuine commitment,” he said.

Chau believes that ultimately, at the heart of accountability is creating a culture of genuine care among the Nueva community, starting with student leaders. Starting next fall, Chau and Bruno hope to implement inclusivity training for student club leaders.

“We are hoping to help student leads to think through how to design feedback mechanisms for their clubs, so when something happens in a club, members have a way to tell the lead who has a space to receive [that feedback],” she said. “For clubs like robotics, Invention Studio, or debate where you’re leading a team of people and have to manage dynamics, I hope this can inspire students to create change.”

Krishnan also hopes for teachers to undergo mandatory gender bias training, believing it will encourage teacher accountability—and knowing that young people often look to the adults in their lives as an example of how they should behave.

“Most male faculty don’t realize when they themselves are being sexist, and most female and nonbinary staff don’t want to stand up to [sexism] because it's been so normalized for them,” Krishnan said. “Because of this, the male student gets the impression that it’s okay to be sexist because the teacher didn't say anything about it, and [the student] continues with this behavior.”

With the spark of student and teacher-led initiatives this year, Carina's fear is for the conversation to stop.

“I hope we can continue the affinity groups. I hope I can pass on our work to younger students,” Carina said. “I just want to make sure it’s less stigmatized and just keep the ball rolling.”

In the future, Luki hopes to see an affinity space specifically for trangender students in STEM.

“I don’t feel like I can fit into [current affinity] spaces,” Luki said. “Sexism sucks, but [for] women in STEM, there’s already an established structure of ‘We’re fighting against this, we’ve all been there.’ That doesn’t really exist for trans people.”

Asudani emphasizes that without taking action, these hopes and dreams stay just that— hopes and dreams. She instead urges every member of the community to actively participate in addressing sexism, whether it be calling out microaggressions or starting their own initiatives.

“People often have a mindset of, ‘What can I do? I'm just a student,’” Anahita said. “But as students, we have a crazy amount of agency, and if [we] utilize that, [we] can get so much done.”