Two separate but inter-linking pieces of research were released just in the New Year.
The first research (featured in the Daily Mail - link) showed that "Fewer men are teaching in schools than at any time since records began and in one in ten primary schools there are no men on the staff at all. More than two out of three teachers are now women. Just 15 per cent of teachers in primary schools are men, down from 20 per cent in 1986. Men now make up 43 per cent of secondary teachers, down from 49 per cent in 1996 and 54 per cent in 1986."
At the same time and well covered on this site (link), the Daily Telegraph reported (link) "Barely a third of boys in comprehensive schools are gaining the GCSEs they need to obtain a job or stay on at school."
The dearth of male teachers means there are less male role models in school to engender the competitiveness and discipline that boys need in school. This can be made even worse when there is no father at home as Michael Gove, Tory schools spokesman said: "Fewer male teachers means fewer male role models for boys who may not have one at home."
The Government, which is belatedly concerned about this issue, are not doing enough and years of the feminisation of education has damaged the life chances of boys up an down the country. Boys, according to the Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA), want to be taught by men (link) and they released a survey suggesting boys were more likely to disrupt lessons and neglect their work if taught by women.
More needs to be done, and remember, if it was girls being behind or there were fewer female teachers, then the Fawcett Society and Commission for Equality and Human Rights would be jumping all over this.
The Growing Gulf Between Men and Women
There is a growing gulf in communication between men and women. The nineteenth century belief man should be strong has allowed increased aggression upon Males from day one. Along with this aggression allowed upon Males is the idea of pulling oneself up by the bootstraps that denies much in terms of mental, emotional, social, and academic supports from day one. The help usually given involves something to help make Male children strong as in sports or other physical competitions. Care in other social, emotional, or even academic areas is still considered indulging the Male. This type of treatment may have proved useful in the more physical nineteenth century. However today, it is working opposite of the need of Males in the information age where it requires much more accumulated mental, emotional, social and academic skills acquired over time. In these areas, Males are being seriously shortchanged.
The increased aggression Males receive from day one, creates three bad things for Males academically, mentally, emotionally, and socially: 1. It creates higher average layers of mental frictions (redefined from higher average stress) which inhibit thinking, learning, and motivation in mental areas. 2. These higher layers of mental frictions also create improper pace and intensity in approaching mental work (apply too much effort when approaching new material) and higher tension that hurts motivation to learn. 3. It also creates the Male ego or defensive cushion that the Male develops from an early age to protect them from the aggressions they receive from society. This Male ego or defensive cushion has the negative consequences of further alienating the Male from “any” various mental, emotional, social, and academic supports they “might just” receive from society. When Males hear firm or hard words from others like teachers or others their minds are thinking defense and not thinking about learning and enjoying the learning process.
The combination of high layers of mental frictions and defensive cushion are creating an impediment to learning that accumulates in great harm over the years for men. In society today, men are given love, honor, and respect or the essentials of their self-worth only on “condition of sufficient” achievement, money, power, status or image. They must fight through the still present, nineteenth century confrontations allowed by society upon them from an early age to achieve those benefits and feelings of self-worth. Society has now created through prejudice and stereotyping, a form of Gender Cast System through mistreatment of Males and over support of Females early training for Males to perform more menial or physical tasks while women are being prepared for white collar positions.
The nineteenth century belief women should be protected and still in effect today, this has created much overprotection and even indulgence for many women. It is creating very low layers of mental frictions collectively for women. This makes thinking, learning, and motivation mental areas much easier. This protection and continuous attention from day one create a high speed expressway that allows for much mental, emotional, social and academic advancement in many areas over time. These two continual supports from society over time create nearly everything a person needs today to succeed in the information age. Since women are given through overprotection, even indulgence, the benefits of love, honor, respect, and continual support, all of the benefits of self-worth from an early age without qualification (simply because they are girls), they are working with much more continual support and interaction to accumulate more continual mental, emotional, social, and academic knowledge and skills that can be transformed easily into money, power, status, and image. Even after this, society’s protection, continued support and view toward beauty and charm continually helps them in the information age.
The combination of this differential treatment has now created a tremendous gulf between men and women today. Women are now surging ahead academically and economically due to this overprotection and men are still puzzled as to why they are falling behind in those areas. You see if you remove the old money from older men, the girls are making more. The current beliefs held by both men and women today is that Males learn differently and/or men are simply lazy and do not try hard enough. These beliefs only add to the gulf between men and women today. The men who believe this and who do not have information to the contrary may believe they are somehow mentally inferior or just not working hard enough. Somehow, humans, men included, tend to reflect the treatment they receive in their lives upon others and do not know or are not allowed by society to say how differential treatment is hurting them. This may lead Males to give up in developing various mental, emotional, social, and academic skills over time. They may limit their interest and desires to smaller windows of fulfillment within their social connections. They will continue to dress up for display, their Male defensive cushion to at least present a plausible image when dealing in areas where they are not as competent. Worse for these Males, they may advance their beliefs and feelings onto their sons from an early age, thus enabling the continuation of the harmful belief of inferiority in the information age.
There is another growing phenomena, this involves the driving of Males from the work place. Part of the reason is there are fewer jobs left for Males in the industrial and other blue collar related areas and more job openings in more white collar areas. But even so, there are other reasons for this change in society. One reason is the nineteenth century belief Males should be strong has left many Males years behind in various mental, emotional, social, and academic areas of learning. This has created a large pool of Male employees who are not able to adapt to information age needs. Another reason is that as more Females enter positions of power and collective control, they are more apt to keep Female employees and lay off Male employees (there is not equal opportunity protection for Males). There is another more complex reason why Females are keeping their jobs and Males are losing their jobs. The nineteenth century belief Females should be protected works in the work place also. It places more constrictions on how jobs, intimidation, force for output, and general respect and care is given to Females. However, society’s allowed aggressions upon Male employees allows much more harsh treatment of Males in terms of verbal abuse, intimidation, job assignments, and lack of respect in general. This difference in treatment over time places the Male in a much more precarious position in deciding whether to continually put up with such mental/emotional abuse or quit or be fired for finally drawing a line at some point. Even when Females face similar treatment on the job, the over all treatment of respect and care usually support them so they are able to carry on and remain employed.
I this now being played out in society as Business Week said that in the last six months, “From last November through this April, American women aged 20 and up gained nearly 300,000 jobs, according to the household survey of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). At the same time, American men lost nearly 700,000 jobs. You might even say American men are in recession, and American women are not.”
This is but a brief excerpt from my learning theory that explains why Males are losing out academically and not able to compete economically. There is also a measure of stereotyping and caste climate that is anti-Male. My complete theory wil go to all on request.
Posted by: rick lynn | Wednesday, 25 June 2008 at 23:36