The Project
Gender Awareness, Tackling stereotypes in Education (GATE)
Defending equality between women and men has always been one of the European Union’s fundamental values. However, even though this principle is anchored in legislation, gender equality is far from being a reality.
Inequalities between men and women and lack of gender diversity can be found in both private and public spheres, starting at home, throughout education, and on the labour market.
One of the main reasons why there is still no real equality between women and men can be linked to the existence of gender stereotypes assigning social roles to women and men.
Boys and girls? Binarity or not? Gender, and beyond…
Point de vigilance/Cautionary Point
The GATE-project rests upon an understanding of gender as fluid and in constant process – in other words: gender and gendered behaviour is negotiated and challenged culturally as well as individually and is performed according to the script in which it inscribes itself.
However, the objective of the GATE-project (to challenge gender stereotypes through education) calls upon an understanding of these very real and existing stereotypes and must therefore address stereotypes through activities and reflections that take point of departure in these understandings.
This means that the project – to a certain extent – operate with a binary understanding of gender but acknowledges and strives towards deconstruction of a binary system in order to accommodate several gender identities.
The main lever to tackle gender stereotypes is education. School plays a crucial role in a child’s socialization process. Within this institution, a child will learn academic knowledge as well as social norms and values. In this context, the GATE project intends to set up an action plan to increase awareness and introduce sup-porting measures to promote gender equality in primary schools in Europe
The purpose of GATE is to improve the prevention of gender-based behavior by deconstructing gender stereotypes in primary education, in 3 steps:
producing a practice compendium to gather innovative good practices that tackle gender stereotypes at school;
modeling innovations to tackle gender stereotypes effectively, thus taking into account all of the dimensions of the school system;
experimenting these modelled activities, including teacher training and coeducational activities for the playground, and evaluate them in schools from all over Europe: Bulgaria, Denmark, Finland, France and Spain.
By raising gender awareness among pupils and teachers, the GATE project will contribute to building a more democratic, tolerant and inclusive society, protective of human rights and fundamental values, which are at the core of the European identity.
This project is funded with support from the European Commission.
This publication only reflects the views of its author and the Commission is not responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.