Top grammars dragged into outcry over abuse
After private school scandal, now state pupils tell of harassment and assault
TOP grammar schools have been dragged into the pupil sex abuse row after allegations of rape, assault and harassment.
One in ten of the country’s grammars have been named on the website Everyone’s Invited, which has collated more than 12,000 testimonies about schools’ ‘rape culture’.
One girl said she had been raped by a pupil from Dr Challoner’s Grammar School for boys in Amersham, Buckinghamshire, at an 18th birthday party.
She said: ‘It happened at the back of the garden and another boy saw it happening yet did nothing to help and just laughed. This was over three years ago and it’s still something I think about.’
In another example, a 14-yearold girl said she had been raped by an 18-year-old pupil at Cranbrook School, Kent, during a party when she was ‘blacked out’ from drinking too much.
She said: ‘I woke up unconscious in a corridor of the party having lost my shoes, my pants and my bra, having a hazy recollection of what had happened. When I went into school the next day I was labelled a slut.’ Another girl said she was raped by her boyfriend, who attended the all-boys Queen Mary’s Grammar School in Walsall. She said: ‘I said no. Rape by your boyfriend is still rape.’
The 18 schools named on the website represent over 10 per cent of the UK’s 163 grammars, which select pupils by ability and are extremely competitive.
The all-boys Tiffin School in Kingston – the second- best achieving state school in the country and admits girls for A-levels – has one of the greatest number of testimonies. Several girls said they had been sent unwanted sexual photos by Tiffin boys, coerced into sex acts, forcibly groped and assaulted in their sleep.
And Bexley Grammar in southeast London was also named, with a girl saying she was ‘sexually harassed and assaulted at school by a classmate’. She added that the school ‘never offered’ her support.
The latest allegations come after a string of testimonies accused private schools of failing to do enough to tackle predatory behaviour among boys. Now girls at state schools have started to speak out – but head teachers stressed on Tuesday that schools can only do so much and parents must also take responsibility.
Bexley Grammar said: ‘We, of course, take all reports of assault extremely seriously and follow statutory and other guidance in dealing with them promptly.’
David Atkinson, head teacher at Dr Challoner’s Grammar, said: ‘Any experience of sexual harassment is unacceptable. We’re always concerned about any reports of behaviour that goes against our core values.’
Cranbrook said it has asked ‘ alumni or current students affected by behaviour that normalises rape and sexual assault to contact the school so that we might help support them’.
Queen Mary’s and Tiffin did not respond to repeated requests for comment last night.
‘Never offered me support’