Guangdong pads gender equality education

Lessons meant to remove deep-rooted stereotypes, prejudice

Students in South China’s Guangdong Province will receive gender equality education starting September, which experts said will help to further equalize the social status of men and women in Chinese society.

Gender equality education in primary and middle schools will start in September to help make students aware of gender equality and practice socialist core values, the Guangdong Working Committee on Children and Women told the Global Times on Monday.

The cities of Zhongshan and Maoming were chosen as pilot cities for gender equality education in 2012. They included gender equality in every subject, China Women’s News reported on Saturday. The curriculum at the two cities can be used by the province and the country, Nanfang Daily reported.

The curriculum teaches first and second grade students how to protect their physical privacy, while fifth and sixth graders learn about the harm caused by sexual harassment.

Middle school students need to accept their physical nature and high school students have to rid themselves of gender prejudice.

Teachers provide students with true-to-life examples or in-class demonstrations to help them change deep-rooted stereotypes on gender, such as only girls cry and do housework, Nanfang Daily reported.

As of June, about 40 workshops and training classes have been given to more than 5,000 teachers and lessons in 42 schools in Zhongshan, Zhongshan Daily reported.

The committee, however, declined to discuss how the classes will be taught when reached by the Global Times.

Song Wenzhen, an official at the National Working Committee of Women and Children, told the Global Times that gender equality education in China only gained ground after the Program for the Development of Chinese Women (20112020) was passed in 2011.

Gender equality involves legitimate rights, interests and the social status of men and women, that’s why it should be taught in schools to expose students to it at a very young age, Song said.

China upholds the constitutional principle of gender equality, which is also a basic state policy to promote progress in the country and society.

Peng Xiaohui, a sexologist at Central China Normal University, said gender equality in China has improved along with developments in the economy, politics and culture, faster than in Japan or South Korea.

However, the document issued by the Guangdong Working Committee on Children and Women does not mention gender pluralism, such as the LGBT group.

Peng explained that the LGBT issue is sensitive in China since the group has turned into a “political movement.”