Sometimes it’s the most inane things that lead to the important conversations about gender and sexuality.

This is what an unlikely coalition of school boys from Isca Academy in Exeter discovered last week during one of the worst British Heatwave in decades. Temperatures soared so high that even the Queen of England had to relax the iron-clad dress code for the Royal Ascot that requires goers to be dressed in formal wear with jackets. The Queen relaxed the rules this year to allow men attend the event without jackets. However, the head teacher at Isca Academy in a rare turn of events was not so lenient, refusing to let boys in the school wear shorts as a wear to beat the heat.

After punishing a student for wearing shorts and disregarding the student’s complaints, she suggested sarcastically that the student ‘wear a skirt’. And so the next day, a group of five students did just that. The number of boys wearing skirts to school everyday (which is permissible according to the school’s dress code) has ratcheted up to 30, and for once the conversation has remained on topic, instead of deviating to the nature of the participating boys’ sexualities.

It has brought up an interesting discussion on dress and how it really doesn’t determine sex, or gender, and it is inspiring to see teenagers and preteens lead this discussion.

Editor