Elephant in the room here. Early Years professionals tend to be women. ‘Childcare’ predominantly viewed as women’s work. Lack of respect & recognition for ‘women’s work’ is ingrained in our patriarchal society. This is why I’m fighting to improve the pay of (1/4) https://twitter.com/juliangrenier/status/1355032931295756290

EY staff at the family centre where I am a trustee. They are well-skilled, incredibly hard-working, passionate staff who deserve to be recognised & for their work to be taken seriously. This is not solely about the public misperception of early years (2/4)

It’s about the way women are treated in the workplace. It’s about the #genderpaygap & #everydaysexism. It’s about #toxicmasculinity ensuring that boys are being taught that caregiving roles aren’t for them. There’s a bigger picture here. 3/4

And it’s not a case of simply increasing men in #EarlyYears it’s about the systemic issues around how women are treated & viewed by society. Until this changes then EY won’t be taken seriously. We need to deal with the elephant in the room. @EverydaySexism @genderanded 4/4

And I write this not just as a professional who wants nothing more than #EarlyYears receiving the recognition it deserves but also as a mum of a #EYFS child whose teacher recently told me that he would be different & find later school life difficult due to us raising him...

...to be keenly aware of sexism & gender stereotypes. Sure @GEA would agree that no educator should tell a parent that their child won’t ‘fit in’. We should all be taking conscious steps to reduce gender inequality, and that is exactly why it should be...

...at the forefront of discussions around the status of Early Years. ( @LetToysBeToys @GenderDiary sure you’ll be interested to read this thread).

@tes you might be interested in this thread in light of the article discussed.