Private coed school’s bold gender balance plans

A private school in Melbourne’s southeast has been accused of discriminating against boys in its bold bid to achieve gender balance.

Woodleigh School in Langwarrin has won a legal bid to prioritise student enrolments based gender. Picture: Susan Windmiller

A private school in Melbourne’s southeast has been accused of discriminating against boys in a bid to prioritise female enrolments.

Woodleigh School has been granted a five-year legal exemption enabling it to select female students over males in order to achieve a gender balance in the school.

One parent objected to the application, calling it “wholly discriminatory”, a Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal hearing has heard.

The parent, who did not appear at the VCAT hearing in February, told the tribunal via email that the gender exemption “disadvantaged boys”.

The parent provided evidence of their experience of trying to get children enrolled at the school, and the negative affect the gender selection process had on their family.

No girls’ schools objected to the application.

Woodleigh School was granted a five-year right to advertise for prospective male or female students in year levels where future waiting lists show a gender imbalance, prioritise students of one gender over another to keep the gender balance and offer scholarships for male or female students only.

Without an exemption, this conduct would be prohibited discrimination.

The college, which is the oldest coeducational school in Victoria, was granted the same exemption in 2016.

Principal David Baker told the hearing the school believed coeducation facilitated respect for equality and dignity for each of the sexes and better prepared students for life in a mixed-gender society.

He said the school aimed to have a gender balance of between 40 per cent and 60 per cent rather than strictly 50/50 per cent.

Having a gender ratio outside that range affected the environment in classes, reduced the range of perspectives in classrooms, and limited the range of social combinations and friendship groups for students, he said.

A similar exemption granted to Ivanhoe Grammar in 2021 was opposed by a number of families expressing concern about the impact of the discrimination on the gender identity of boys who were overlooked.

Carey Grammar was also given a gender exemption in 2018 despite the objection of three nearby girls’ schools all within two kilometres – Ruyton Girls’ School, Camberwell Anglican Girls’ School and Methodist Ladies’ College.