Gender and attainment Flashcards
(31 cards)
Patterns of achievement
In the late 1980s girls began to gain more GCSEs than boys and by the mid 1990s they outperformed males in most subjects.
By the mid 1990s they were outperforming males at A level in some subjects.
There are now significantly more females at university than males, and there are marginally more females on degree courses that were traditionally male dominated, like law and medicine.
Summary of Data:
In early years, fewer boys have a “good level of development” by age 5.
By the end of primary school, more girls than boys are meeting the standard expected levels in reading and writing. However, boys do slightly better in maths.
By the end of secondary school, fewer boys achieve GCSE maths and English at a grade 5 or above, and have a lower attainment 8 score on average. Boys are more likely than girls to be suspended and permanently excluded.
In terms of A-levels, girls are more likely than boys to achieve 2 or more A-levels (but the gap is closing and is now very small). Despite this, boys are more likely to achieve an A*.
Men are less likely to go to university, and have a lower retention rate. However, men still dominate STEM subjects, and women dominate in subjects related to education and humanities. `
External explanations for the achievement of girls:
Changing expectations of women and girls
Impact of the feminist movement
Changes in the labour market
Individualisation and the risk society
Changing attitudes and expectations -Wilkinson
Wilkinson (1994) argues that the increased attainment of girls is part of the “genderquake”- fundamental changes in the attitudes towards female roles in society.
“Women’s aspirations and their image of themselves have profoundly altered in the past quarter of a century. Seventy per cent of the women surveyed say that they want to develop their careers or find employment, while only 50% regard having children as a goal. Less than a quarter of young women between 18 and 24 feel that women need a stable relationship to be fulfilled.” Wilkinson (1994)
Changing attitudes and expectations -external factor-primary socialisation
One external factor that could explain this is primary socialisation. Traditional gender ideals are taught in the family (primary socialisation), which can impact the ambitions and expectations girls have for themselves.
In “Just Like a Girl” (1976), Sue Sharpe found that working class girls (15 year olds) tended to prioritise love, marriage, and children, over their future career prospects. This meant they lacked any really incentive to work hard at school and attain highly.
However, Sharpe repeated her research in 1994, and found that the ambitions, expectations, and priorities of working class girls had changed, with their career now being their main concern for the future.
Changing attitudes and expectations
Other feminists argue that the masculine and feminine ideals taught in the family are also reinforced through agents of secondary socialisation, such as peer groups and the media (as well as schools themselves).
For example many teenage magazines targeted at female audiences presented ideologies of beauty, marriage, domesticity, and subordination that serve to strengthen the messages of femininity families instil into their female members.
Angela McRobbie compared girls magazines in the 1970s and the 1990s. In the 70s, she found that the main focus was on being a housewife and a mother, but by the 90s this had changed. Women were portrayed as assertive and independent role models.
The impact of the feminist movement
From the 1960s onwards, feminists campaigned for equal opportunities policies to create more equality within education and the workplace
This is because many of the barriers have been removed and schooling has become more meritocratic, so that girls who generally work harder than boys achieve more.
Girls now recognise that they can be financially independent and do not need the support of a male individual.
This spurs on girls to succeed within education, as they see themselves having more opportunities today than they once did.
Equal Opportunities Policies
Equal Pay Act 1970- Employees who do equal work or work of equal value must receive the same pay as workers of the other sex.
Sex Discrimination Act 1975- Renders discrimination against women unlawful except where its special treatment in favour of women based on pregnancy, numbers in the workforce or when being a man or a woman is a genuine occupational qualification
Equality Act 2010- Sex, being married, and being pregnant and on maternity leave are all protected characteristics
Improvements in maternity pay and leave- Many women were routinely sacked for becoming pregnant till the late 1970s. The UK introduced its first maternity leave legislation through the Employment Protection Act 1975
Changes in the family
Increase in divorce rate
Increase in cohabitation and fall in marriage
Increase in lone parent families
Smaller families – falling birth rate
Women are no longer financially reliant on men. Qualifications give women more financial security in the future.
Most lone parent families are headed by a woman, meaning they have to take on the breadwinner role.
Women are having fewer children and delaying having children until later in life- perhaps to pursue a career first.
All of this has led to a greater variety of role models for girls to look up to.
Changes in the labour market
Jobs in the service industry tend to be predominantly female dominated.
Men have traditionally occupied manufacturing jobs, in which there has been a huge decline due to deindustrialisation (the reduction of industry in the UK). Whereas jobs and opportunities in the service industry have increased.
Therefore, not only have the educational ambitions of girls increased, there are also more opportunities for them within the labour market today than there once was.
Individualisation and risk society -Beck
Beck argues that society today (second modernity) is characterised by risk. What examples does he give of this?
Increased divorce and lack of security in work.
Beck argues people are experiencing a process of “individualisation” due to the risk society. What does this mean?
People are increasingly having to be more self-sufficient and reliant. They are responsible for their own fate. In particular, women are becoming more individualistic due to changes in the family, laws etc.
How does this impact the attainment of girls within the education system?
Education is seen as a means to future financial independence, allowing women to be self-sufficient in the risk society.
Equal opportunities policies: Boaler
Jo Boaler (1998) argues that the introduction of equal opportunities policies are the key reasons for changes in the achievement of girls.
Specifically, Boaler notes the effectiveness of girl-specific programmes, such as GIST and WISE, in creating a more meritocratic education system.
GIST stands for Girls Into Science and Technology and was a project in the early 1980s to try and address gender differences in subject choice and encourage more girls to choose sciences at school. It was followed by the similar WISE campaign, which still exists today.
Positive role models in schools:
The majority of teachers are female- around 76% in 2023/24. Only 14% of nursery and primary school teachers are male. Girls increasingly have positive role models while boys may fail to identify with female teachers.
Teaching and learning styles of female teachers may not suit male students as well as female students.
Fewer female teachers are in leadership roles, particularly in secondary schools.
However, this is increasing, particularly for head teacher positions- increased role models for girls
Challenging stereotypes in the curriculum:
Older sociological studies found that girls and women were often portrayed in stereotypical gender roles in educational materials.
Lobban (1974) analysed 179 stories used by schools as part of their reading schemes. Girls and women were almost exclusively portrayed in traditional domestic roles.
However, more recent research has demonstrated diversification of the curriculum.
Weiner (1995) argues that in the past, girls were often portrayed in textbooks as wives and mothers, and science textbooks only featured male scientists. However, recent developments have led to greater diversity and equality in the content and imagery used in teaching, leading to greater achievement in girls as they are presented with more positive images of what they can achieve beyond traditional gender roles.
Teacher attention in the classroom: francis
Becky Francis (2000)- boys tend to dominate in the classroom, drawing more attention to themselves than girls do.
She observed 4 different classes across 3 schools, and in 8 out of 12 classes she found boys were noisier than girls during lessons.
This led to boys receiving more negative attention from teachers, being disciplined more frequently and sometimes more harshly than girls.
Girls who were not paying attention were quieter and did not draw as much attention to themselves.
Mitsos and Browne (1998)
Mitsos and Browne argue that girls are more successful in coursework because they are more conscientious and better organised that boys.
Girls spend more time on their work, take more care in how it is presented, are better at meeting deadlines, and bring the correct materials and equipment to lessons.
Mitsos and Browne argue that these factors have helped girls to benefit from the introduction of coursework in GCSE and A levels.
evaluation of Mitsos and Browne (1998)
Evaluation:
Even if we agree that girls are better at coursework than boys, it’s unlikely to be a major influence in terms of the gender gap.
Exams have much more influence on the final grade than coursework.
Since 2015, most GCSE and A level subjects do not include any coursework that counts towards the final grade- yet the gender gap persists
Marketisation policies:
League tables (introduced in 1988) have made girls more desirable to schools, as they are known to achieve higher grades and have fewer behavioural problems than boys.
Schools, therefore, have an interest in admitting more girls, as doing so can help maintain their reputations and funding levels.
If girls are more likely to be recruited by good schools, they are more likely to do well (self-fulfilling prophecy).
Slee argues that boys may be seen as “liability students”- giving the school a bad image and deterring high achieving students who enable the school to improve its position in the league table.
linking to feminist view
Liberal feminists
Celebrate progress made so far!
However, this doesn’t mean inequalities do not exist. Further progress needs to be made by:
Continuing to develop equal opportunities policies
Encouraging positive role models
Overcoming sexist attitudes & stereotypes
Radical feminists
More critical view! Recognise girls are achieving more, but schools are still patriarchal. For example:
Education still limits subject choices and career options
Heads of secondary schools are still likely to be male
Women under-represented in many areas of curriculum
Sexual harassment of girls continues at school…
Review of sexual abuse in schools and colleges (2021, Ofsted)
Nearly 90% of girls, and nearly 50% of boys, said being sent explicit pictures or videos of things they did not want to see happens a lot or sometimes to them or their peers
92% of girls, and 74% of boys, said sexist name-calling happens a lot or sometimes to them or their peers
54% of those aged 16 and above and 40% of 13- to 15-year-olds said unwanted touching occurred a lot or sometimes
“For some young people, sexual abuse and harassment is so commonplace, that they see no point in reporting it”
Pupil’s sexual and gender identities:
Through our time at school our sexual and gender identities will be influenced, constructed, reinforced.
E.g. ‘Hegemonic masculinity’ – the culturally dominant ideas of the “ideal man” (successful, competitive, provider).
This subordinates female and LGBTQIA+ identities.
Pupil’s sexual and gender identities: lees
Sue Lees (1993) discusses the double standards girls experience in sexual morality, whereby boys gain status for being sexually promiscuous, and girls lose it.
Boys would boast about their sexual exploits, but call a girl “slag” if they appeared to be sexually available, and a “drag” if they were not. “
Sexual conquest” is approved of and given status by male peers and ignored by male teachers, whereas ‘promiscuity’ among girls attracts negative labels
This reinforces pupil’s sexual and gender identities, and can impact things like subject choice and attainment.
Pupil’s sexual and gender identities:Mac an Ghaill
Other sociologists have linked this to the “male gaze”- a way that boys and male teachers may look at girls, viewing them in a sexual way and making judgments about their appearance.
Mac an Ghaill argues that this is a form of surveillance through which dominant heterosexual masculinity is reinforced and femininity is devalued – it is a way boys can prove their masculinity
In male peer groups, verbal abuse is used to reinforce dominant definitions of masculinity. Teachers also play a part in reinforcing gender identities. Male teachers have told boys off for ‘behaving like girls’ in the classroom.
This therefore results in segregation of the genders within school which ultimately leads to girls opting for typically feminine subjects such as English and boys opting for typically masculine subjects such as Maths.
Working class girls -archer
Although girls on average attain higher grades than boys, it is not true to say that all girls are successful in the education system.
Louise Archer has conducted research on female peer groups. She found that working class girls gained symbolic capital (status that we obtain from others) from hyper-feminine identities.
e.g. make up/ hair/ clothing, having a boyfriend and being ‘loud’ and outspoken towards authority.
