Girl School Committee of 1866

The Flickskolekommittén 1866 (Girl School Committee of 1866), was a Swedish governmental committee issued by the Swedish Parliament, the Riksdag, in 1866 to examine organization of female education in Sweden and produce suggestions of reforms and recommendations on how the policy regarding education for women should be organized. This was the first governmental committee of its kind, and was to have a large impact upon the educational system in Sweden as well as the gender roles and policy regarding women's rights in general of its country.

Since the introduction of a public compulsory school system for children of both sexes in 1842, education for females had been a constant question of debate for politicians as well as in intellectual circles: while the new school system allowed every male the opportunity to go from compulsory education to secondary education and finally university, the public school system were closed for females after 5th grade. Except for private teachers, only two educational institutions were open to females after puberty: the free pauper schools, which taught poor girls professions, and the girls' schools for students from the middle and upper classes. These existing girls schools were normally more or less equivalents to finishing schools, with the goal to make the student a "lady", and they were forcefully criticized for their shallow and "useless" education. In 1842, only five girls' schools offered a more serious academic education: Wallinska skolan in , Askersunds flickskola in Askersund, och Fruntimmersföreningens flickskola, Kjellbergska flickskolan and Societetsskolan.

Since the introduction of a public compulsory school in 1842, progressive politicians had debated for the organisation of governmental secondary education of females: this would ensure a far better quality than when the secondary education were only provided by private schools, who were subjected to the views of their students conservative parents. The conservative view was that females should be educated in the home for the home; that education and knowledge could destroy the feminine qualities that differed women from men and cause women distaste for the role of wife and mother; and that the idea of equality could not interfere with the order stated by God. In parallel, the Population growth had created a large amount of women who could not marry and were forced to support themselves and with few means to do so.

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