There is a story going around the interwebs about a pair of professionals who traded their electronic signatures for a few weeks and about how the male then discovered that the female was treated differently and about how hard women have it in the professional world.
It reveals how much trouble women have being taken seriously as experts. On anything. In reading the comments left on this story, I discovered the same sad narrative in nearly every one. Women, strong, intelligent women, were doubted at every step, on a daily basis, because no one believed they could possibly know what they were talking about.
Reading through these stories I thought, well, at least that doesnāt happen to teachers. As women in a traditionally female field, we are less likely to be immediately doubted when we speak, less likely to be dismissed purely because we are female.
The whole teaching profession is constantly being asked to see its manager. The whole profession is constantly being doubted. The whole profession is seen as being ill-informed. Teachers are never seen as experts. We are regarded as something between babysitters and lazy, spoiled whiners, who just want our summers off.
I couldnāt stop thinking about it.
Teaching is seen, by in large, as a feminine pursuit. And as such, teachers, while well-educated, well-trained, and well-read, are seen as less PROFESSIONAL and worthy of respect than our counterparts in other fields. When people DO praise teachers it is often with the kind of nostalgic affection reserved for things which are cute and sweet, not with the kind of respect given to others in other, more male dominated fields.
Everyone thinks they know what is best for education. Education policy, education critique, education reform: all are dominated by a kind of condescending man-splaining which would be abhorrent and vilified were it not accepted as the status quo.
Watch the video of the president signing his nomination for Betsy DeVos. He says, āBetsyā¦education, right?ā like it could be any little honorarium he is throwing to any billionaire with a checkbook. Because education doesnāt need to be overseen by an expert. It is just womenās work. Put a nice, grandmotherly looking, well-coiffed lady in charge and itāll be all good.
And when I have spoken out against this (and I have pretty much not stopped doing so for awhile now) people have pointed out to me that you do not need to have been a teacher to run a the Department of Education.
Really? Why? Because the base assumption is that teachers do not really understand big, important things like running a government bureaucracy. Our only purvey is the classroom, which like the home is to be paid respectful lip service, but not to be seen as a venue for real work.
I have had WOMEN, whom I LOVE, say things to me about educators like, āHe is trying to run a company and she is worried about pipe cleaner art. Not really the same thing.ā
The whole problem with the way our country talks about teachers is that, by in large, we are seen as a group of women, and therefore, the work we do is not seen to be really that challenging. There are whole books and television shows dedicated to the idea that a man, having excelled in another field, can stop by a classroom for a short period, for the purpose of entertainment or self-gratification, and somehow this is okay. No one thinks this about courtrooms or operating theaters.
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