It’s a girls’ club

by Anandi Carroll-Woolery on December 15, 2009

Photo courtesy of Nicholla Johnson

Anandi Carroll-Woolery has been educated at both all-girl and all-boy schools

By the time I was eight years old, I had already attended five different elementary schools. That statistic would produce yawns from seasoned Army brats. But could they beat this? By age 19, I had attended all known gender combinations of learning institutions—coed, all-girl and all-boy schools. Let me take you on a journey through all three.

My coed experiences all occurred at elementary schools in cities in Southern Ontario. Being the new kid at the beginning of every grade meant I was an easy target for bullies looking for fresh prey. As a girl with a tan complexion, I easily provoked these bullies into punching me and shouting “Go home, gay Paki!” once the teachers were out of eye and ear shot. I lived in fear of elementary school boys.

When I was nine, Dad found a lucrative job in his birthplace, Trinidad & Tobago, and relocated the whole family. The first tip-off to my new school was when Grandma had me fitted for a royal blue checkered tunic, a crisp white shirt and hair ribbons. It was the uniform that impressed me, more so than the lack of boys. I was happy with the trade-off.

The Trinidadian girls initially treated me with high regard—I was this pale (relative to them) Canadian girl with a strange accent. The teachers expected me to catch up quickly, and would administer corporal punishment when needed. I got only one dose of “licks” early in my T&T academic career, which was enough to dissipate the celebrity status that surrounded me, and I became one of the girls.

We were grilled in academics and taught needlework, netball and first aid to relax. Our teachers actively encouraged us to take extra lessons after school and excel in extra contests sponsored by the city. Their slave driving meant that I passed entrance exams for the premiere high school on the island.

High school was touted to prepare impressionable youth for real life, but it was really an excuse to prepare us for two sets of grueling exams—for our high school diplomas by age 16 and for pre-university A’level courses by age 18. I probably would have continued my path to extreme nerdom, except for one detail—our brother school, St. Mary’s College, was across the street. During class, I could conveniently gaze to my heart’s content into their courtyard.

I was the boy-crazy prankster in public, but hit the books in private. I had no desire to be the dunce in a class of driven, brilliant all-stars. My friends and I balanced serious studying with periods of intense idleness. In our five years together, we:

Learned to swim
Won a lip-sync contest under the sobriquet of “Khemistry”
Collected books and built a library for an orphanage
Sang a charismatic version of the “Magnificat” at a music festival, which we enjoyed but was critically panned
Manufactured terrible nicknames for our teachers
Mercilessly played tricks on the new teachers. I think (I hope) no one cried or quit as a result.

After the Form Five exams, with eight distinguished credits, I was slated to pursue A’level Mathematics, Further Mathematics and Physics, a combination offered only at a certain school, located across the road.

Going to from an all-girl to all-boy (with the exception of myself and four other girls) environment was a unique challenge. Boys, nice to look at from afar, were a different species altogether up close. For them, especially the super macho soccer team, sexual innuendo was the primary form of communication. I had no idea how to respond, so I relied upon the only two weapons in my puny arsenal—ignore or flirt—and both were often translated into stuck-up or slut.

Luckily, I discovered that I had an affinity for solving complex mathematical problems and with the help of the other girls, I wrestled equations into submission. The boys in our class were sufficiently awed, and treated us as equals. My high-school education ended successfully, with four A’level passes that gained me entry into the University of Waterloo, Faculty of Mathematics.

Who gets the credit for my achievements—the coed, all-girl or all-boy school? Even though they all shaped the person I am today, I cast my vote for the girls’ school. It was there that I had the freedom to pursue math and science without fear of teasing or insults. I made lasting friendships and still smile at the antics we undertook to alleviate our stress. Who would have thought that an all-girl Catholic school was not such a bad place to be?