Are we over-gendering our educational futures?
It seems that everywhere I look these days there’s a gender inclusion policy, a drive to remove gendered barriers, a focus on girls in STEM… and while most of me is cheering the initiatives, there’s another part of me that wonders if we’re not applying labels that risk excluding those who don’t identify as female, in addition to devaluing the “traditional female” job roles.
I’m just going to come right out and say this: I don’t know the answer. What I know is, I’ve got a whole lot of questions and if I’ve got them, there’s a pretty good chance that students do too.
The biggest question is: what do we even mean by “gender”? The United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 5, Gender Equality, is to Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls. This seems to somewhat negate any social constructionist arguments about the nature of gender, its fluidity or lack thereof, whether or not it’s a binary, to what degree it is influenced by culture and tradition, and even if there are such things as gender-biased tendencies toward certain skill sets or ambitions. It is undeniable that there is a disproportionate number of women and girls around the world whose existence is wretched: unpaid labour, physical and sexual slavery, child marriage and other horrific forms of disempowerment and dehumanisation. It appalls me that the freedom to make decisions about the fundamentals of life is, in some parts of the world, limited by whether or not your body has the potential to incubate a child.
Yet even as these liberties are delineated by sex, so too do we apply less obvious limitations even to those of us who are fortunate enough not to be born into those authoritatively patriarchal societies. And we often do it with good intentions.
“How do we get more girls into STEM?”
This question implies two things that concern me: the first is that girls aren’t naturally interested in or drawn to science, technology, engineering or mathematics subjects. As a girl who grew up with a great love for these subjects, surrounded by friends who also loved these subjects, many of whom grew up to pursue these areas in their careers, I find this patronising and patently false. And the second thing may be even worse: not only are girls not naturally interested in STEM, but they need the omnipotent, benevolent “we” to shift them into that track whether they like it or not. What about the girls for whom STEM subjects hold little interest? What about the boys for whom STEM subjects hold little interest? Why are we holding STEM up as the answer to all our hopes and prayers, when it represents only part of our predicted future — a future that will require many different intelligences? How do we get more girls into STEM? Maybe by not talking about them as if they’re not already there.
The FutureWe Framework recognises that STEM concepts and practice are vital to the future, but as one set of literacies among many. It is beyond time to stop separating, even unconsciously, “soft and hard” skills — and it is imperative that we stop equating job roles with gender. Gender is a fluid, dynamic construct that alters not only from culture to culture, but from person to person — and has little to no bearing on whether or not a person is suitable for a particular job or industry. The sooner this is not only recognised, but so accepted that it is no longer an issue, the better for our collective future. It should make no difference to the way we teach and talk about the world of work. Our thinking should be agile and responsive to the needs of the individual and the wider community. We should constantly challenge our own biases and preconceptions.
I want to live in a future where the exceptions are no longer held up to prove the rule. A woman who is successful in a “male-dominated” field is not a freak or a headline — she is a success, just as her male colleagues are successes, or her gender-fluid, non-binary colleagues are successes. The sooner we stop acting as if someone stepping out of a “traditional” role is noteworthy and build a new tradition of rewarding merit, determination, flexibility and creativity instead of conformity to perception, the sooner we can get on with the job of moving forward as a united humanity.
