Becoming the Headteacher at a GDST school, from an HMC one has, in some ways, been a huge eye opener. Girls in the old world I inhabited were rather pigeon-holed, judged for the subjects that they chose to study and the way they dressed and were remarkably absent in physics and design technology lessons.

Here at Bromley they are the leaders, the decision makers, the risk takers, the supporters, the intellectuals the athletes and, yes, the only inhabitants of our physics and DT departments.

At a recent conference looking at girls education the delegates talked at length about what the young women of today should expect from school and how we can best prepare them for the world of business and commerce. Inevitably the topic of sexualisation and gender stereotyping was discussed. In my school the girls are refreshingly at ease with themselves. There is no pressure to wear their hair in a particular style, have high heeled shoes to impress the boys or spend hours in front of the mirror each morning applying make-up. That is not to say that my girls dont care how they look, or are behind in the fashion stakes. Far from it. The difference is that in my school they dont need to worry about those fripperies during school time - as a day school our girls have plenty of opportunity to socialise with whomever they choose at weekends and after school, including boys in the local boys school. This means that they really can have it all.

I find it rather worrying that if my girls leave to go to boys schools for Sixth Form, which, unfortunately, some of them do, they find themselves giving up netball to watch rugby at the weekends, giving up DT to do something less masculine, and giving up maths and physics because in these lessons the boys dominate and the girls do not get a look in. For girls to be leaders in the world of work they need to be able to lead in school. A girls school allows them the time and space to develop the confidence and skills that they need to rise to those challenges while they develop as a young person - and in a day school such as a GDST school, she can still have a boyfriend out of school. Lucky girls!

Louise Simpson. Head.
Bromley High School GDST.