Matilda Head
TW: Discussion of rape, sexual abuse, assault and harassment.
Last week, the anti-rape campaign Everyone’s Invited, released a list of 2962 schools whose names had been mentioned in testimonials of rape and sexual abuse. Of the 2962 schools, 2,556 are secondary schools and 406 are primary schools.
“over 15,000 testimonies have been shared on the Everyone’s Invited website”
The campaign established in June 2020, was created by Soma Sara, a UCL student who sought to expose the prevalence of sexual abuse and rape culture in society. By creating a form allowing survivors to submit testimonies of their abuse, Sara hoped to create an environment where people could talk about their trauma in a culture ‘which stigmatises sexual violence to such an extent that people do not talk about these issues.’
Since its creation, over 15,000 testimonies have been shared on the Everyone’s Invited website containing details of rape, sexual assalt, abuse, and harassment. In releasing the list of schools implicated in testimonies, Soma hopes to show that ‘rape culture is everywhere.’
She expressed her worry for ‘individuals at those schools, victims and survivors who are struggling in the aftermath of sexual violence and sexual assault and have nowhere to go or nowhere to voice their stories.’
It is a damning report for the quality of sex education and safeguarding in schools. Simon Bailey, the National Police Chiefs’ Council lead for child protection, told ITV News that ‘this is the next scandal,’ within schools. He continues: ‘it cannot be right that everyday, young girls, and I’m talking about primary aged girls as well, are having to run the gauntlet or sexual harassment, misogyny, the sending of nudes, unsolicited or indecent images being sent to them.’
Ofsted Investigation
The publishing of the Everyone’s Invited list comes the same week as the release of an Ofsted investigation. Which noted sexual abuse was ‘normalised,’ and that teachers ‘constantly underestimate’ the scale of the problem. The same report showed that almost 80% of girls questioned experience sexual abuse ‘sometimes,’ or ‘a lot.’ Furthermore, data collected from their visits to 32 schools around the country, found that 9 in 10 girls believe being sent unsolicited explicit content is a part of school life.
Ofsted were so shocked by the findings of the report that they have warned all schools to ‘act on the assumption’ that harassment is happening in their schools, even if they haven’t had any reports.
If you have been affected by any of the issues discussed in this article, you can contact the abuse in education helpline set up by the NSPCC at 0800 136 663 Monday to Friday 8am – 10 pm or 9am – 6pm at the weekends, or email help@nspcc.org.uk
If you want to take action to support an end to rape culture, check out Everyone’s Invited on Instagram and Twitter.
Featured image courtesy of Mihai Surdu on Unsplash. No changes were made to this image. Image license can be found here.
Matilda Head
Matilda is 20 years old and a Psychology student at the University of Cambridge. If not writing for her University papers or Empoword, she'll be reading, listening to a musical theatre soundtrack or playing with one (of many) of her pets. You can find her on TikTok @matildasnewsroom.