VCAT: Parents of some boys claim Ivanhoe Grammar’s push for more girls discriminates against boys

An exemption given to a prestigious Victorian coeducational school, allowing it to favour girls, is discrimination and “the thin edge of the wedge”, some boys’ parents claim.

Ivanhoe Grammar School has been granted another exemption to positively discriminate in favour of girls. Picture: Supplied

Boys are being discriminated against and missing out on places at prestigious Melbourne private school Ivanhoe Grammar because of its ongoing campaign of preferencing girls, who effectively “jump over” males on the waiting list, a tribunal has heard.

Ivanhoe Grammar — which commands secondary fees upwards of $25,000 a year — was this week given the green light by the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal to continue its campaign of positive discrimination towards girls.

The special exemption allows the school to advertise for girls, structure waiting lists and allocate student placements based on sex, and provide scholarships and bursaries to prospective and current students based on gender.

The school was first granted an exemption in 1999, with the latest extension handed down in 2016.

This week’s VCAT decision will extend it further, to December 2026.

But the tribunal heard some families of boys in the school’s catchment area believed their children had missed out on places because of the focus on girls.

An objection from a group of “parents, uncles, aunts, grandparents” claimed one boy was told he didn’t get into Ivanhoe Grammar because he was not a girl.

“The response raised concerns about the effect that rejecting a boy on the basis of sex can have on their gender identity, their overall identity and anger management. The response raised concerned this anger may manifest as anger against girls/women. The response stated that seeding anger in this way is entirely inappropriate,” VCAT member Christopher Thwaites noted.

“It also raised concerns about the negative effect discrimination will have on their boys, including increasing travel time and costs and less sleep for boys who will have to travel further to attend a different private school . . . and that discrimination against boys is damaging to boys and society as a whole.”

A render of the Ivanhoe Grammar Sports and Aquatic Centre. Picture: Supplied

Another objection - from a group calling itself Victims of Ivanhoe Grammar Discrimination - claimed discrimination against future male students was discrimination against all other coeducational schools that did not seek special privileges through VCAT

“It changes thinking and culture, and is the thin edge of the wedge,” the objection stated.

Yet other objections claimed a boy on the school’s waiting list had been advised he was unlikely to gain entry because girls would ‘jump over him’ in the queue, and that a prospective male student, who lived near the school and had wanted to enrol, had been “deeply disadvantaged by the school’s ongoing discrimination”, and forced to travel a long way to a school of equivalent standing.

“Boys should no longer be discriminated against on the flimsy grounds that the accretion of female students will be a little faster. The costs to boys is too high. The (Discrimination) Act is there for a purpose and the school should not discriminate on grounds of sex, race, age, disability or anything else,” the objection said.

Ivanhoe Grammar principal Gerard Foley told the tribunal the one-time boys’ school, which turned coeducational in 1992, was seeking to ensure gender balance at its senior campuses by marketing to girls.

Ivanhoe Grammar students in 2019. Picture: George Salpigtidis

He said the school had continued to honour its commitment to the number of places traditionally available to male students, and these numbers had climbed.

Between 2010 and 2016 - when there was no exemption in place - there had been a significant imbalance in the numbers of enrolments, in favour of boys, Mr Foley said.

Currently, Ivanhoe Grammar would not be able to maintain or improve the current balance between male and female students without the exemption, he said.

However, it did not plan to rely on exemptions indefinitely, as “a degree of equilibrium” in the balance of male and female students would be reached in future, using other strategies.

In granting the exemption for a further five years, Mr Thwaites said he agreed that without it, the proportion of female students would decrease and the school would not be able to offer a true, coeducational experience.

Mr Foley told the Herald Sun on Friday the school welcomed the VCAT ruling.

“This exemption allows the school to continue to provide a quality, gender balanced coeducational experience for all students,” he said.