In an exclusive interview with Building Design, Eleni Kyriacou says that the Bartlett systematically discriminated against women in its grading and left a trail of devastated lives and students with long-lasting mental health issues

The whistleblower whose complaints triggered the investigation that uncovered the toxic culture spanning decades at the Bartlett School of Architecture has welcomed the “damning” report which she said vindicated the victims.

But Eleni Kyriacou also claims that the extent of the sexism within the school, and the impact this had on many women’s final grades, has not yet been sufficiently revealed.

Speaking to Building Design, she shared data from a Freedom of Information Act (FOI) request that points to significant underperformance by female architecture students dating back to 2007.

The data supports her claim that there has been a general tendency for a higher percentage of men than women to get first-class degrees at undergraduate level between 2008 and 2019. Women were also getting far more 2:2s than their male counterparts.

Women’s percentages improved markedly from 2017 onwards whereas those for men have been broadly similar throughout the period covered by the UCL data.

“There are people who have been unfairly failed and it destroys their life,” Kyriacou said. “They can’t get their RIBA part I so can’t be an architect – and they can’t do a masters in something else.

Why were women underperforming? There is no reason they should be...

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