The Student Room Group
Do these notes on The Role of Education from a general feminist persepctive help?

Although the main focus of feminist educational research (gender inequalities) has remained largely unchanged over the past 25 years, the emphasis of this research has shifted somewhat - from explanations about why girls achieve less than boys in the education system (because, in the main, they don’t anymore) to explaining how girls learn to cope with a range of school and workplace disadvantages.

This subtle shift of emphasis doesn’t necessarily mean we should dismiss historical feminist research out-of-hand, as being both outdated and irrelevant to our (present-day) understanding of the role of education. Although such studies originally focused on explanations for female underachievement they are, arguably, still relevant as explanations for differences in career choice and progress. In addition, these explanations assume a new relevance as political concerns about boys’ underachievement have led to an educational focus on ways to help them “overcome the gender gap” (usually involving a resurrection of ideas and practices criticised in feminist research over the past 25 years…).

Broadly speaking therefore, current Feminist explanations of female disadvantage, centre around the following ideas:

Socialisation research. Eichler (1980) highlighted how differential socialisation experiences - and different social expectations - of males and females help to construct different gender identities and adult role expectations. In the past, for example, the education system contributed to the way women saw their primary adult role in terms of the private sphere of the family (as mother and housewife, for example) and, although female horizons have widened somewhat over the past 25 years, Feminists have argued traditional assumptions about masculinity and femininity continue to influence both family and work relationships.

An interesting example to illustrate this idea is that subject choice at the higher (non-compulsory) levels of our education system is broadly gendered, in the sense we can identify different patterns of subject choice between males and females (more boys, for example, study science subjects like Chemistry, while more girls opt for social science subjects). These educational choices are further reflected in adult career choices (engineering, for example, is male-dominated while something like nursing or secretarial work is female-dominated) and these patterns point us towards the idea of underlying social and educational processes that effectively push males and females into different career paths.

Norman et al (1988), for example, argued teacher expectations, especially in early-years schooling, emphasised female roles related to the mother / carer axis and while this may no-longer automatically translate into women seeing their primary role in terms of caring for their family, work roles in our society continue to be framed around the basic idea of different male and female (mental and physical) capabilities.

Thus, although over 25 years ago, Stanworth (1981) found both male and female A-level pupils underestimated girl’s academic performance and teachers saw female futures in terms of marriage, child-rearing and domestic work (while future careers were stereotyped into “caring” work such as secretarial, nursing and so forth) the question we have to consider is the extent to which, for all the evident changes in male and female educational performance, the general picture is still broadly similar in terms of the adult roles performed by men and women in our society.

Identity: Following from the above, Feminist research in the recent past focused, as we’ve suggested, on ideas like the gendering of the school curriculum, in terms of how pupils saw different subjects as “masculine” or “feminine”. Such gendered perception, it was argued by writers such as Woods (1976), helped to explain things like lower levels of female participation and general achievement in science subjects. Similarly, social policy initiatives, such as Girls Into Science and Technology (GIST), explored the general question of why girls were underrepresented in science subjects and the answers this initiative produced were informative on two levels; firstly, science was seen as both difficult and demanding and, secondly, the image of “scientists” was seen by girls to be both unflattering and, more significantly perhaps, unfeminine and idea that keys into perceptions of both male and female identity in our society.

This perception links into ideas about the way personal identities (what we individually feel about being male or female, for example) are filtered through social identities (how society in general suggests males and females should look and behave, for example). An individual choice in this instance what educational subjects to study and, ultimately perhaps, what kind of work one does in adult society is heavily influenced by the way others see the implications of such a choice.

Despite the introduction, in 1988, of a National Curriculum that ensured all pupils studied subjects such as science and maths (traditionally perceived as masculine subjects) up to GCSE, the evidence from post-16 education suggests the type of gendered curriculum identified by Woods still exists, as the following table demonstrates:

United Kingdom GCE A level or equivalent entries for young people: by selected subject, 2001/02
Source: Summerfield and Babb (2004)

Subject % Males % Females
Physics 78 12
Computer Studies 76 14
Economics 74 16
Mathematics 60 40
Biology 38 62
English Literature 25 75
Social Science 24 76
Home Economics 03 97

The Department for Education and Skills (2007) now renamed the Department for Children, Schools and Families has suggested that “Gender differences in subject choice become more accentuated post-16: Girls’ most popular subject is English, while boys’ is Maths. Psychology, Art and Design, Sociology and Media/Film/Television Studies are amongst the 10 most popular choices for girls (but not boys), while Physics, Business Studies, Geography and Physical Education are in the top 10 for boys (but not girls)”.

As we might expect, this difference in subject choice at A-level translates into differences
in subject choice at undergraduate level. Self and Zealey (2007), for example, note that “…a higher proportion of women than men studied subjects allied to medicine [such as nursing], while a greater proportion of men than women studied business and administrative services…Higher proportions of men than women studied engineering and technology subjects and computer sciences”.

Thus, although the focus of feminist research in this particular area may have changed, over the years - from concerns about female underachievement to concerns about gendered participation - the post-16 evidence (where students are given a free choice of subjects to study) suggests participation levels are related to concepts of male and female identity. If this is the case, it seems unlikely the causes of this gendered participation only begin after the official school-leaving age. Thus, past feminist research into the:

School Curriculum still has both currency and usefulness. Spender (1982), for example, argued the curriculum was geared towards the needs and interests of boys, so as to render girls “invisible” within the classroom. Similarly, Deem (1980) argued the school curriculum and subject choices were highly gendered and Mahony (1985) demonstrated how girls were frequently marginalized in the classroom by both boys and teachers. In addition, she pointed-out how staffing structures reflected male importance in the workplace (the highest status teaching jobs were - and remain - occupied by men). In the twenty or so years since Mahony’s observation this discrepancy remains apparent. Mirza et al (2005), for example, note that “Women make up over half (53%) of the secondary teaching population, but are still under-represented in secondary school senior management positions, particularly headships” (around 30% of secondary headteachers are women). In the nursery / primary sector Department for Education and Skills (2007) figures show that while 16% of teachers are male “34% of head teachers are male”.

As we’ve suggested, the focus of feminist research has changed somewhat in recent years in the light of increasing female educational achievement - something that’s reflected in two main ways:

Work: Despite their educational achievements, women consistently lose out in the workplace. As Treneman (1998) notes: ‘The statistical under-achievement of boys in schools is nothing compared with the statistical over-achievement of men in life’ an idea reflected in a couple of ways:

1. Earnings: For the past 38 years it has been illegal to pay men and women different rates of pay if they are doing the same or roughly comparable types of work (the Equal Pay Act, 1970) and yet the government’s Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (2007) showed that , in 2007, “…women’s average hourly pay was 17.2% less than men's pay” (although the good news is the gap has narrowed, from 17.5% in 2006). This pay-gap seems to occur right across the board from the part-time workers (who earn around 35% less than men) through university graduates (“Women graduates are paid less from the very beginning of their careers, with men earning £1,000 more than their college classmates within three years of leaving university”: Benfield, 2007) to the boardroom (“Female directors earn up to 26% less than men”:Ward, 2007).

2. Gender Stereotypes: Warrington and Younger (2000) noted male and female career aspirations still reflected traditional gender stereotypes (childcare, nursing, hairdressing and secretarial for girls, computing, accountancy and plumbing for boys) and Gordon (1996) found that although teachers frequently praised girls’ efforts they reported finding boys more interesting to teach and gave more time and effort to motivate and retain their attention - once again suggesting the different levels of importance teachers give to male and female work. In this respect the Equal Opportunities Commission’s “Gender Equality Duty” (2007) guidance argues: “Girls' educational achievements are not necessarily helping them into well-paid jobs [and] Eliminating gender stereotyping in school education, in vocational training, and in careers choices is a vital step towards tackling the gender pay gap in employment,"

Roger and Duffield (2000) suggest a number of reasons why girls tend to avoid science subjects that are equally applicable to a range of gendered curriculum choices:

Primary socialisation entrenches concepts of gender identity in males and females, conditioning the choices they make in school. Reay (2001), for example, found a variety of female identities developing in the primary classroom, including, most interestingly, as the following exchange suggests, girls who wanted to be like boys:

“Jodie: Girls are crap, all the girls in this class act all stupid and girlie.
Diane: So does that include you?
Jodie: No, cos I’m not a girl, I’m a tomboy”.

Role Models: In primary teaching, for example, nearly 90% of classroom teachers are female, leading to an early connection between gender and work.

Careers advice tends to reinforce traditional male - female work roles and divisions.

Work experience places boys and girls into traditionally stereotyped jobs. Mackenzie’s (1997) study of “school-based work experience” placements found, for example: “45% of girls [in the study] were allocated to caring placements but these did not always reflect their choices. Boys who did not get their preferred placement tended to be allocated to occupations which were regarded by them as either neutral or as traditionally male while girls who were unsuccessful were allocated to traditionally female occupations”.

One conclusion we can draw from this type of research is the relationship between vocational forms of education and training and gender stereotypes in the sense that “vocational training” is much more likely to result in both males and females being channelled into “traditional” forms of gendered employment. The argument here, of course, is not that “academic education” somehow guarantees a lack of gender stereotyping and segregation in the workplace - Kampmeier (2004), for example, found that across the European Community “Gender segregation in the labour market has not been considerably reduced during the last decades, as far as “typical” male and female occupations like electricians and nursery nurses are concerned” but rather that there are greater opportunities for stereotyping and segregation in vocational training.

The implication, therefore, is that probably unintentionally one role of vocational forms of education is to reinforce gender (and indeed class for that matter) stereotypes and divisions in ways that that not quite so apparent with academic forms of education (because they don’t necessarily channel young people into particular forms of work at a relatively early age).

Identity: The emphasis here is on understanding different levels of achievement amongst females by examining different forms of identity (how class and ethnicity, for example, impact on gender). Warrington and Younger (2000) for example, found very little difference between the percentage of boys and girls who leave school with no qualifications.
Reply 2
hat off to you,