EDUCATION IS IRREVERSIBLE
Historically and globally boys and men have been the first to receive education and become literate, and women and girls have been the last to have access and the first to have their human right to education taken away, or interrupted as was & is being tried under the Taliban in Afghanistan.
England in 16th century was thought to be rather advanced in educating girls as well as boys though there was definitely a class bias, and women have in general been given only gradual admittance to the full mysteries of education. At my own Cambridge College founded in 1873 women were allowed to sit the exams but were not granted a degree until 1948.
An estimated 23% of women in the world today are illiterate as compared 13% with men (www.dfid.gov.uk/.). Many of these women & men are in older age groups as enrolment rates for both girls and boys has increased greatly in recent decades all over the world. Whilst many countries have achieved gender parity at primary and secondary levels however there are often many fewer girls in universities and colleges, and in vocational training or other types of continuing education.
Girls may be pushed or pulled out of school earlier for a variety of reasons, though the underlying basis is the same perception that education and a professional career are secondary for women.
Girls may be taken out of school in order to get married, to help on the family farm, or to work in the garment industry or in some other type of new activity supported by Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) which requires little training & is poorly paid and insecure.
There are also cases however where boys are pulled out of school earlier to get ahead making money, often in some semi-legal way, and girls are left in the education system usually to enter civil service jobs which do not require a high level of specialized knowledge. This is the situation for several Caribbean countries where women dominate the civil service, but many aspects of commerce and trade, including the very lucrative drugs trade, are largely male-dominated.(unicef.org)
Traditionally educators have focused their attention on numbers of children who enroll, complete, drop or are pushed out. This is evident even from the UN Declarations and Global Goals.
For example, the UN Millennium Development Goal 3 on Gender Equality & the Empowerment of Women has as its first target to ‘eliminate gender disparity in primary and secondary education, preferably (sic) by 2005, and in all levels of education no later than 2015 (mdgmonitor.org)
It is increasingly recognized however that there needs to be more attention paid to the qualitative and ‘socialization’ aspects of the educational system. Education is, or should, after all provide more than mere information.
Amongst qualitative aspects are the socialization of girls and boys in class relative to participation, leadership, confidence and self-expression.
Classroom socialization is seen by many socio-linguists and educators as a key element in instilling the different communication styles of boys and girls. ‘All participants in the classroom collude in this: teachers by paying more attention to boys, boys by talking more and at greater length than girls, girls by talking less’ and being rewarded and approved for their docility. This early socialization sets the life- pattern for the different communication styles – competitive vs. co-operative - of men and women respectively.
(See also Power Speak(s) on the Gender & Communication page of this site).
Girls and boys learn about ‘correct’ gender behaviour also from the ways that men and women boys and girls are depicted in texts and illustrations in used in class. It is surprising that men are still consistently portrayed as judges, CEOs, or truckers, and women as secretaries, or bakers of cakes…not ‘chefs’ in tall white hats and checkered trousers but ‘cooks’.
Streaming of girls and boys into different academic subjects is another element in this larger picture of socialization. By the time pupils are of an age to choose they are already imbued with the ‘appropriate’ choices. The messages received from both teachers and parents are probably consistent. Studies in the US have shown that even where girls score as highly as or higher than boys in maths , girls, unlike boys, did not attribute high scores to their ability but to luck or getting the right questions and usually demonstrated a consistent belief in their lack of ability in this ‘male’ field. This perceived inability keeps them from selecting this option at higher levels. Girls saw making an effort in maths as less likely to lead to success than boys did. The reverse situation was true for languages and literature. Thus it can be argued that the foundations for gender-based segregation of jobs in the labour market (See Engendering Economics on this page) are laid down at a very early stage.
This situation has also provoked debate as to whether girls and boys should be taught in separate classes at least at certain stages of their development, such as adolescence, when it is also argued that preoccupation with the opposite sex interferes with their studies. It seems perhaps a pity now to reverse the work of centuries in integrating school classes and sex-segregation in the education system is perhaps not the best preparation for Real Life. (now.org/preg)
Globally, the majority of primary school teachers are women as taking care of small children is perceived to be their natural role. But there is increasing debate as to whether there should be more male primary school teachers to provide young boys with positive male role models and/or to cope with the increased violence in schools. Perhaps those two aims are not totally consistent?
(telegraph.co.uk) It would be interesting to observe whether an influx of men into this professional category would result in its being accorded higher status and better pay?
Underlying all of this discussion is the subterranean debate as to which aptitudes and proclivities are ‘hard-wired’ and which acquired.
A couple of years ago the President of Harvard University, Larry Summers (now President Obama’s Economic Advisor) had to resign his post after he suggested that women might not be intellectually equipped to become top scientists and mathematicians and that men have more intrinsic aptitude for ‘high level science’, although what he seemed to be talking about was actually that more men get to occupy senior positions in maths & science for which intrinsic aptitude would be only one of the determining factors?
It is now well- recognized that the architecture of male and female brains is different.
Research also shows that the sensory perceptions of males and females differ, in that women can see colours and textures which men cannot see. Similarly women are thought to have more acute sense of hearing and smell. As the senses are the gateways or the portals to the brain it seems likely that different sensory aptitudes would affect brain development.
This having been said there are more areas of similarity and overlap between women and men than there are differences…. most people fall in the mid-range of aptitudes in maths and languages for example rather than excelling at one or the other; and probably also most of us occupy a middle sensory range, though most women feel that men have a higher tolerance of noise and bad smells than they do themselves!
There may be innate differences between male and female bodies and brains but from birth those differences interact with complex forces of socialization. What we don’t yet understand is how important or otherwise those innate differences are and how to make sure that Nurture… such as class-room socialization … does not impose limitations rather than opening up potentials.
Education opens new doors of understanding and opportunity to women and men which cannot be closed & in this sense is irreversible, but even gender parity in terms of numbers of girls and boys educated does not guarantee gender equality in the wider world. Education may equip women for a role in the public sphere which is denied on other grounds including the intangible but powerful factors of bias and discrimination which the education system itself should work to eliminate and not to reinforce.