Mini Project-1

So for my project I explored the bias in school settings based on gender. After a lot of deliberation and asking some peers what to do, I decided to compile a picture slide show of pictures and quotes based on the research I did. Just so you guys know, the song that goes along with the pictures has a purpose! It was a theme song for the 70's women’s movement….I would usually never listen to something like that.

I was interested in this topic because I’ve personally experienced biased based solely on gender in my schooling career. In particular, in eighth grade I had a teacher who was known as someone who favored boys.  I never wanted to believe it, I thought that it couldn’t be possible. However, it truly was! She would often be-little girls indirectly when they would say something wrong. If one of her favorite male students begged her to go outside instead of having class, she always eventually gave in and did what the boys wanted. My thoughts were that she wanted to be seen as a cool teacher, but at most female’s expense.  

This got me thinking about other people who may be talking about this same topic. To my surprise A LOT of people were talking about it, and doing so with a big passion! I took my research back to the Title IX days all the way to today’s time.

If you guys are unaware of what Title IX is I’ll give a brief history lesson…..Title IX came from a huge feminist movement in the seventies. It was an addition to the Educational Amendments basically saying that any educational programs can’t discriminate based on gender.

This obviously helped a lot but a married couple, David and Myra Sadker wrote a book in 1995, Failing at Fairness: How Our Schools Cheat Girls. This book looked at the progress of gender equality in the classroom since the passage of Title IX.

Most of their findings were that Males are still highly favored while girls are only praised for “girl” things like being neat, organized, and mild mannered. There were a lot of discussions on how this bias resulted in jobs in mathematics and science being overpowered by men.

On the other side of the discussion were people like Ruth D. Nass who claimed that boys were at the disadvantage because they are more susceptible to disorders.

This project really changed my view on this topic. I use to think that how students were treated had a dramatic impact on their success rate. Though it does play some role, I truly believe that it’s minimal. I experienced this but it didn’t affect me in getting to where I am today. I think that it’s something that depends on each person