ONE IN THREE TEENAGE GIRLS NO LONGER FEELS SAFE AT SCHOOL AFTER LOCKDOWN – School closures have particularly impacted teenage girls

One in three teenage girls no longer feels safe at school, a significant increase since lockdown, a study has found.

Some 34 percent of Year 9 girls in England said they did not feel safe in school in 2023, compared with 15 per cent in 2019, the year before the Covid-19 crisis, according to the report.

One in four Year 9 boys in England said they felt unsafe in school in 2023, compared with 17 per cent in 2019.

Declining emotional engagement among secondary school girls is a “pressing issue that the English school system faces”, the report said.

The latest TIMSS study, carried out by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement’s (IEA), provided countries with comparable data on pupils between 2019 and 2023.

The working paper from UCL researchers suggested that the decline in secondary school pupils’ enjoyment of being in school since the pandemic was larger in England than in many other countries.

Professor John Jerrim, the lead author of the study at UCL’s Faculty of Education and Society, said: “The key finding in this paper is that the decline in emotional engagement is significantly greater in England compared to other countries.

He added: “Our research points towards something happening during the pandemic – quite possibly school closures – that has particularly impacted teenage girls.