Mock Funding Proposal—How Schools Fail Women: Gender and Its Intersections in an Inherently Patriarchal System

Originally Written for Forms of Violence: Gender, Race, and the Politics of Representation at Emerson College, taught by Dr. Kiri Gurd

Abstract

I propose a book exploring the ways in which the American education system fails women, and how that failure impacts and influences educational systems around the world. Within this, we’ll explore the ways institutional “official” barriers to entry for women have been reworded and perpetuated since schools have “gone co-ed;” the actions individual women and organizations have taken to offset this oppression (and how those previous actions have been insufficient). Finally, we’ll consider the ways in which academic institutions (or professors within their own classes) can ensure that women have the same opportunities once they’ve entered college.

The book will take into account differences in race, class, disability, sexuality, gender identity, and upbringing. It is designed for people already within academia and will include a part on “how to fix it for academics” so even if they cant impact structural change (or are in the process of changing it but it’s not instant) they can do things in their classrooms, in their research, and etc, right now. But it will also be suitable and accessible to non-academics to inform themselves on the disadvantages women face and overcome. 

  1. Literature review 

There is quite a bit of research done on women in academia, and the ways the educational system fails marginalized groups. However, the former often focuses on just gender and the ways it materializes in sexual assault, graduation rates, participation rates, etc, or they will focus on just one intersection—gender and race, for instance. The latter often acts in a gender-blind way, comparing the experiences of all marginalized people to that of all privileged people. 

Some theoretical work on womanhood and its intersection with other forms of disadvantage include Ahmed’s (2017) work and ethnography done to discuss living in a feminist mindset. Lindio-Mcgovern (2005) discusses methods of conducting feminist research. Spivak questions the ability that disadvantaged peoples have to ever speak in resistance without contributing to or existing in the oppression they face. Each of these will be useful as theoretical backbones. 

A lot of work has been done to track girls’ interest in STEM fields as they move through elementary to middle and high school (Silva 2019), and there’s some work done to discuss the gendered barriers to this (MeTooSTEM 2019), but it’s not usually analyzed from a strictly sociological method and focuses only on STEM programs, rather than education as a whole. 

Some of the work showcasing the issues women face in academia includes the work Gonzales et al. (2019) which explores the experiences of many women across intersections, and Maseti’s (2018) auto-ethnographic work on her experience of being excluded in academia. However, both of these pieces have a limited scope in which they were able to work—either just one woman, or only a handful of women, all of whom were discussing their experience in higher education and as educators. This has not looked at the earlier years of discrimination against women, and, because of the time/space limitations for journal articles, they were not able to get a larger sample size of experiences. 

Ahmed (2012, 2017) has explored the ways ways racism and diversity are excluded or included from university/academic life based on what’s convenient for the institution and the ways diversity work (done by women in particular) has largely just been an institutional appointment and not an actual step towards change. With these ideas, I’ll consider the issues that arise when we expect all change to come from a flawed institutional structure. Individuals must take action into their own hands while we wait for institutions to actually follow through on the work they say they will do. Lindo-McGovern (2005) has looked at the ways institutions create power and reinforces the epistemic violence of knowledge that works against women and underprivileged groups. 

Some of the methods of making change on an individual level have been discussed within my own piece, “We Know You Hate It: Increasing In-Class Participation Anyways” which discusses methods of equalizing participation within the classroom to combat the disparity of men participating more than women. (The proposed method should also equalize disparities between other places of disadvantage, but focuses on women due). Lawson et al. (2018) looks at the ways professors’ behaviors can support and encourage women’s success, particularly within male-dominated majors. Stanley et al. (2016) finds that women tend to put in more effort in order to offset a particularly difficult class. However (and, again), all of these are more focused on higher education. 

There have been a few examples of books tackling a large, complicated problem about women in an in-depth and intersectional way. These include Orenstein (2017) in her ethnographic work with young women and sex-relations in high school and college, and Ahmed (2012, 2017) in her ethnographic and auto-ethnographic work on feminism and diversity in institutions. Alexander (2012) aso does the work to unpack a complex social issue that has evolved, and I will be taking her work on the constant re-establishment of barriers against African Americans as a starting place for one of my research questions: how have “official” institutional barriers to entry for women have been reworded and perpetuated since schools have “gone co-ed? I will be modeling their methods of inclusion on the intersections, as well as their accessible style. 

Work that focuses on disadvantages within academia but is somewhat “gender blind” includes that of Henretta et al. (2012), which looks at how parental structure impacts financial contribution and how that reinforces inequality based on the opportunities students have because of that contribution. The work of Klasik et al (2018) observes that students who grow up in locations with limited college options tend to apply further away from home, and students with limited colleges that match their academic qualifications are less likely to apply for further-away matching schools. These findings suggest students in “education deserts” are forced to handle the higher expenses of moving, or are disadvantaged by their lack of opportunities for success. Robinson (2016) finds that seeing an academic counselor in high school correlates with more college applications, and found that it has an impact even when other forms of information are lacking. Finally, Todorova (2018) finds that students who are the first in their families to go to college have less know-how in writing their personal statements, and are therefore disadvantaged compared to students with generations of understanding the admissions process. While these have included high school and college in their analysis, and looks at the ways specific groups are disadvantaged by the education system, they don’t make extra note of how gender interplays with this, nor do they look at even younger education experiences. 

Within this book, I intend to expand the current discussions of women in education. I hope to create an inclusive look at the ways in which women are disadvantaged as they move through the institution of education, from high school and below to college and beyond. Within this, intersections of capital will be analyzed and explained. 

  1. Project Description

I propose a book exploring the ways in which the American education system fails women, and how that failure impacts and influences educational systems around the world. Within this, we’ll explore the ways institutional “official” barriers to entry for women have been reworded and perpetuated since schools have “gone co-ed” (in similar tradition to Alexander’s The New Jim Crow), and the actions individual women and organizations have taken to offset this oppression (and how those previous actions have been insufficient). Finally, we’ll consider the ways in which academic institutions (or professors within their own classes) can ensure that women have the same opportunities once they’ve entered college.

I intend to expand the current discussions of women in education. I hope to create an inclusive look at the ways in which women are disadvantaged as they move through the institution of education, from high school and below to college and beyond. Within this, intersections of capital will be analyzed and explained.

The book will take into account differences in race, class, disability, sexuality, gender identity, and upbringing. It is designed for people already within academia and will include a part on “how to fix it for academics” so even if they cant impact structural change (or are in the process of changing it but it’s not instant) they can do things in their classrooms, in their research, and etc, right now. But it will also be suitable and accessible to non-academics to inform themselves on the disadvantages women face and overcome. 

The layout of the book will be as follows:

Introduction – A brief history of women in academia (Ahmed 2012, Gonzales 2019). This serves to contextualize the questions I ask and arguments I’ll make, but also to ensure that I’m not assuming knowledge of the readership in a way that would just reinforce the elitist vision of academia. Will also include a look at how disadvantaging women disadvantages society as a whole and reproduces social inequality, even outside of gender—the “why care” portion.

Early Education – I’ll analyze the ways in which societal gender roles are portrayed and taught in early education. Through this, the trend in which young girls lose interest in STEM fields as they progress through elementary to middle school. I hope to find examples of school systems working to combat these issues to show the direction we’re headed and contrast against historical issues we’ve seen. 

Middle Education – In middle and high school, students are moving through puberty and towards independence. Gender roles are being heightened with developing understandings of sexuality (Orenstein 2017). This is also when students often begin taking on jobs and existing within the “real world.”  I’ll also look at how schools are handling these changing times. There have been controversies surrounding dress codes, sexual education (and how inclusive it is or isn’t), and sexual assault which are specifically related to gender, but other high school issues like gun violence, stress, and anxiety are also prevelant and worth discussing. I hope to find examples of school systems working to combat these issues to show the direction we’re headed and contrast against historical issues we’ve seen.

Higher Education – The college years are very interesting for women, in particular. Women are graduating at higher rates than men (and seem to be doing more work to maintain good grades [Stanley 2016]), they’re enrolling in STEM majors at nearing equal rates but are dropping out of degrees before graduation (mostly due to harassment, it seems [MeTooSTEM 2019]), and women participate less in class (likely due to professor’s implicit biases and because of the trend of men’s more aggressive behavior) (Burcham 2019, Muslimah 2018). 

College is more expensive than ever, which further disadvantages women of lower socioeconomic status, forces them to be exemplary to get scholarships (when wealthy women can be more mediocre). Its structure is based around the ability to attend classes consistently during daylight hours. This limits both women from lower socioeconomic status and single-income women who have to work and are only able to do so at a part time, as well as child rearers who don’t have a flexible schedule, and mentally ill/disabled women who aren’t able to consistently make it to class and are thus unable to do well, unable to attend college at all, or are restricted to subpar and often underfunded online education formats. All of these issues are prevalent in highschool as well, but it worsens the older women get. 

Universities have attempted to rectify some of this, with affirmative action programs and general recognition of gender inequality, but there are often still issues in terms of a still-male-dominated pedagogical theory and teaching staff (Lindio-McGovern 2005, Maseti 2018)). I hope to find examples of school systems working to combat these issues to show the direction we’re headed and contrast against historical issues we’ve seen.

Educators – This section will cover the ways female educators are disadvantaged within their fields. There has been a history of undervaluing women, which is discussed within questions of the pay gap and inequality of teaching staff; there’s been news of harassment of female faculty members; and constant interpersonal battles of people diminishing, discrediting, and ignoring female academics (from both students and other academics). I’ll compare the ways we see this misogyny while women are students to how it affects them when they’re educators. I hope to find examples of school systems and professors working to combat these issues (Lawson 2018) to show the direction we’re headed and contrast against historical issues we’ve seen.

“Fix It” Conclusion – This will go back over some of the methods discussed to better the issue and relieve the stressors affecting women in the education system, including both institution-wide change that will need to be accomplished in the long run, and actions individuals can take to change the interactions they have on a daily basis and will encourage the institution to make the change “from below.”

Goals of the Book:

The intended outcomes of this book are to educate and ignite change. While many (women in particular, obviously) are aware that women are disadvantaged, and even that they’re disadvantaged within the educational institution, the general public may not understand how this interacts across a woman’s life, how it materializes even when women are graduating college at higher rates than men, or how it reproduces other forms of inequality outside of gender. However, just educating people on a subject is not really enough when it comes to creating change. So, this book will include methods of fighting these inequalities throughout, analyzing what has worked and what hasn’t, at various levels throughout the academic institution. 

  1. Research Design
  • Research Questions/Thesis:

The current education system fails women and reinforces gender inequality, in multiplying degrees for underprivileged women.

  • In what ways have institutional “official” barriers to entry for women been reworded and perpetuated since schools have “gone co-ed”? (In similar tradition to Alexander’s The New Jim Crow)
  • What actions have individual women and organizations taken to offset this oppression? (Based on Stanley et al. 2016)
    • Why are the actions individual organizations have taken (affirmative action, financial aid, etc) insufficient/how do those specific actions just continue to reproduce these challenges?
  • How can academic institutions (or professors within their own classes) ensure that women have the same opportunities once they’ve entered college? (Based on Burcham 2019)
  • Key Concepts Operationalized:

During this project, I’ll be discussing the three forms of violence we’ve studied in this course: epistemic, largely as it relates to the societal narrative of what women can accomplish in school/in their lives, but also in the ways educational institutions themselves enact violence against women based on what is taught (and not taught); structural, in the ways academia punishes women and holds them back; and interpersonal, in instances of direct violence against women to disuade them from pursuing their careers (and in that, the structural lack of support women have after-the-fact). 

In discussion of how these inequalities are engrained (within epistemic violence) I’ll discuss femininity, masculinity, and “doing” gender, all of which are enforced and created as methods of controlling and limiting students—women in particular. While discussing ways the academy ignores women (in its course readings, teaching staff, and pedagogical theory), I’ll look at Foucault’s idea of power-knowledge and show how men’s creation of knowledge has reinforced their hold on power. 

I’ll also be looking at the social spaces different women inhabit and the capital they hold within those, to analyze how women of different race, class, sexuality, ability, gender identity, age, etc are treated, and how that may change throughout their lives. 

Finally, I’ll be looking at methods of resistance that have been attempted before, and propose new ones going forward, both which can redefine the current academic structure, and which can work within the structure as stepstones towards this greater change. 

  • Operationalize Method:

For the sake of room to explore, I am proposing a non-fiction, research-based book, intended to be accessible to mass appeal and for a low purchase-cost. 

  • Data Collection:

This book will follow feminist research methods (Lindio-McGovern 2005). I’ll do ethnographic research with students and academics throughout the educational system over an extended period of time, seeing their day-to-day lives, the large-scale discrimination and small-scale microagressions they face, and understand the ways they interact with these challenges. Within this ethnography, I’ll maintain an understanding of my position in relation to the other women I’m working with and maintain a reflexive research standpoint, to attack any biases I may be bringing in as I enter different social spaces. 

To support this ethnography, I’ll include diversity statistics within different educational systems, I’ll analyze my ethnography with theories from key sociologists (maintaining an understanding of the ways they may have contributed to these exact oppressions), and interviews with organizations who are currently attempting to combat these issues.

Bibliography

Ahmed, Sara. 2017. Living a Feminist Life. [Electronic Resource]. Duke University Press. https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=cat05467a&AN=ecl.2341040&site=eds-live.

Ahmed, Sara. 2012. On Being Included. [Electronic Resource] : Racism and Diversity in Institutional Life. E-Duke Books Scholarly Collection. Duke University Press. https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=cat05467a&AN=ecl.1347626&site=eds-live.

Alexander, Michelle, “The New Jim Crow” in The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness, (The New Press, 2012), 178-220.

Burcham, Ava, “We Know You Hate It: Increasing In-Class Participation Anyways.” Essay for Behavioral Economics, Emerson College, 2019.  

Gonzales, Leslie D and Aimee LaPointe Terosky. “On their own terms: Women’s pathways into and through academe.” Journal of Diversity in Higher Education July (2019). 

Henretta, John C., Douglas A. Wolf, Matthew F. Van Voorhis, and Beth J. Soldo. 2012. “Family Structure and the Reproduction of Inequality: Parents’ Contribution to Children’s College Costs.” https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.4496F495&site=eds-live.

Klasik, Daniel, Kristin Blagg, Zachary Pekor, and Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis (CEPA). 2018. “Out of the Education Desert: How Limited Local College Options Are Associated with Inequity in Postsecondary Opportunities. CEPA Working Paper No. 18-15.” Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis. Stanford Center for Education Policy Analysis. https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=ED592356&site=eds-live.

Lawson, Katie M., Laura Y. Kooiman, and Olyvia Kuchta. “Professors’ behaviors and attributes that promote U.S. Women’s success in male-dominated academic majors: Results from a mixed methods study.” Sex Roles 78, (2018): 542-560, https://proxy.emerson.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.proxy.emerson.edu/docview/2015619698?accountid=10735.

Lindio-McGovern, Ligaya. “Transnational Feminism and Globalization: Bringing Third World  Women’s Voices from the Margin to Center,” in Critical Globalization Studies edited by Richard P Appelbaum and William Robinson, 333-347. Routledge, 2005. 

Maseti Thandokazi. 2018. “The University Is Not Your Home : Lived Experiences of a Black Woman in Academia.” South African Journal of Psychology, no. 3: 343. doi:10.1177/0081246318792820.

“MeTooSTEM: A Mission to End Sexual Harassment in STEM.” Technology Networks. Accessed December 12, 2019. https://www.technologynetworks.com/tn/articles/metoostem-a-mission-to-end-sexual-harassment-in-stem-319750.

Muslimah, Maziyyatul. “Is Students’ Speaking Participation Related to Students’ Personality and Gender?” Alsuna, 1 (2018) doi:10.31538/alsuna.v1i1.30.

Orenstein, Peggy. Girls & Sex: Navigating the Complicated New Landscape. New York, NY: Harper, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers, 2017.

Robinson, Karen Jeong, and Josipa Roksa. 2016. “Counselors, Information, and High School College-Going Culture: Inequalities in the College Application Process.” Research in Higher Education 57 (7): 845–68. https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=eric&AN=EJ1115787&site=eds-live.

Silva, Vitor. “8 Statistics and Facts about Women in STEM – Built By Me.” Built By Me – STEM Learning Center, June 4, 2019. https://www.builtbyme.com/statistics-facts-women-in-stem/.

Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty, “Can the Subaltern Speak?” in Can the Subaltern Speak, 66-111.

Stanley, Laura E., Emma M. Delmontagne, and William C. Wood. “Offsetting Behavior and Adaptation: How Students Respond to Hard Professors.” Journal of Education for Business 91 (2016): 90–94. doi:10.1080/08832323.2015.1122565.

Todorova. 2018. “Institutional Expectations and Students’ Responses to the College Application Essay.” https://search-ebscohost-com.proxy.emerson.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=edsbas&AN=edsbas.23724900&site=eds-live.

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