By Natalie Woodlock HOBART -- Students at Sorell High School have come under criticism from John Bednall, a columnist for the Mercury, and others for defying a rule which bans male and female students from holding hands or playing sport together during school hours. After students went to the media and organised petitions against the ban, it was amended to allow males and females to play netball together, although all other sports are segregated. Other school administrations have attempted to enforce similar sex segregation. At Cosgrove High School, students are required to stay 60 cm apart. In several private mixed schools, teachers often patrol the grounds to enforce the rule. At another school, male and female students are not allowed to show any type of affection to each other if on school grounds or if in school uniform. In his column, Bednall infers that students should not have control of issues that affect them. "School is not the real world", he wrote. "Schools are places where trained and committed adults intervene." Bednall advised the students of Sorell High: "In the artificial, institutional bureaucracy of a school, they must put aside some of the behaviours and predilections which sit more comfortably in the real world". Hobart Resistance organiser Sarah Stephen said, "Teachers and school administrators should not have the right to stop students showing basic social behaviour. This repression of physical contact between students is a step back to the Victorian era and artificially separates schools from the rest of society. The bans infringe student rights and clearly step over the line into unfair control and shaping of students' behaviour. Students should be given more power to decide and have input into their own education and school rules."
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