Looking among the female members of staff at my school, I often wonder if they are their own worst enemies.

They set extremely high standards for teaching, organisation, appearance and life in general (much higher than those set by the males) and then criticise other women, publicly and privately, when these are not met.

The fact that they work harder, are more precise and dedicated and generally seem to care more about their jobs than men is undone by petty infighting and bitching.

Together, women should rule the world (and most schools). And yet, when we look around society (and schools are, let’s face it, just microcosms of society), we see patriarchy. 

Why is this? Why don’t women - and female teachers in particular - unite and be strong together?

Natural role models

The natural world gives us some interesting insights into successfully operating matriarchies: lions, elephants, bees, Bonobo chimps, Orca whales - in all of these cases, the females work cooperatively and they have power.

The males of the species are often ousted at a young age and become loners or, as they are generally bigger and stronger, are put to use with their physical assets. The females of the species have been seen to attack in groups to successfully save young from prey and cooperatively raise their young too.

Whereas we human women just stand around having a “chat” at the waterhole about who has got their priorities wrong and attempt to undermine each others’ skills.

Arguably, men “succeed” in schools, society and life because they don’t backstab and hold grudges to the same degree. Men do not go out of their way to undermine each other.

If women followed this model, and were just a bit nicer to each other, then just imagine the possibilities…

The writer is a secondary English teacher in the south of England