This Month in Gender Equity: March 2020
We return this month with our series that recaps our favorite (or least favorite) moments in gender equity from news, media, and long reads all over the internet. You'll see installments for This Month in Gender Equity one week each month. If you have ideas or contributions, leave a comment or tweet at us!
School superintendents are overwhelmingly male. What's holding women back from the top job?
The Gates Foundation recently spent almost half a million dollars trying to figure out why women do not occupy superintendencies at the same rate as men. Frankly, my cynical side kicked in when I read this. I recently completed a study examining the rates at which women and people of color are promoted to principalships relative to their white male peers. Unsurprisingly, women and people of color tend to have more teaching experience before becoming assistant principals and then wait for promotions longer than do their white male peers. So, naturally, when principalships—the positions that almost exclusively feed into superintendencies—overrepresent white men, district leadership positions are likely to do the same. And I got there without a half-million-dollar grant. (Told you I was feeling feisty.) All of this demands that we figure out better solutions for identification, recruitment, and retention of nontraditional candidates than we currently have. Women need to put themselves forward at higher rates than they do now. They need to make themselves visible and available for significant leadership opportunities (and then they need to pay it forward by tapping and mentoring other women). Only then will networks of non-male superintendents begin to dismantle the ongoing and damaging stereotypes about women's leadership at the district level and instead build a system of leaders who are known for their competence, skill, and passion.
The imagined threat of a woman who governs like a man
I knew before I finished the article that this was the work of Rebecca Traister, patron saint of the angry woman in politics and one of our favorite authors. Her recent article in The Cut recounts the now-debunked story of Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recruiting a primary challenger to face her fellow New Yorker, Hakeem Jeffries. The story, as it turns out, is nonsense. But the unique element, as Traister artfully explains, is that such a flex on the part of AOC could happen. The congresswoman has not made a habit of waiting her turn, paying her dues, or—whatever the metaphor—acquiescing to the (typically white male) powers that be. Quite the opposite: she has demonstrated patterns of advocating fiercely for women, people of color, and the marginalized, and much of that happened before she ever swore her oath of office. This approach, as Traister points out, could be a costly move, but only because we are unaccustomed to seeing power within the purview of women. I look to Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez's example of power use without fear and with a great deal of anticipation. Power is one significant avenue by which things get done, and that potential should be better distributed across genders than it currently is.
What does #metoo mean to men and boys in high schools?
Despite what the comments on Twitter might tell you, there is a secure place in the #metoo movement for men and boys. But as high schools grapple with what #metoo means for their female students, men and boys can feel like they can't find that place in the movement. What questions are okay to ask? In what ways can they be supportive and how does that support fit into the constant messaging they get about masculinity and conquest? What is the appropriate way to pursue a romantic interest? How do boys reconcile their understanding that consent is paramount with the idea that men are supposed to be the pursuers in relationships? This article details some of questions that boys struggle with around the #metoo movement and I think it is a conversation well worth having. In order for the culture around consent and the treatment of women to change, men and boys must be brought in as allies. And the way that this happens? By allowing the conversations and the questions, by talking about how men and boys should act in the specific, not just in generalizations that can be difficult for boys, new to the world of dating, to navigate. Lauren and I have written and spoken a lot about calling people in to the movement, rather than calling them out. Wouldn't this be a great time to do that?
My pronouns are she/her.
My first experience with discussing my pronouns came during my time as a college student at UCSC when we were asked to identify our pronouns as part of an ice breaker in a Gender and Education class. So it came as no surprise to me that it is a university that is pushing for the inclusion and acceptance of different pronouns. One particular school at Harvard, the John F. Kennedy School of Government, is going so far as to make the pronouns into stickers that students can stick to the nameplates that they have in their classes. While some worry that this might be excessive, I have to say, if this makes students more comfortable and recognizes their true identities, then why not do it? There are so many anxieties that exist in classrooms, around identity, politics, intellect, preparation. Why contribute to more worries? We have absolutely nothing to lose by including these pronouns, and I give this school credit for putting the needs of their students ahead of others' lack of understanding and acceptance. Well done, Harvard. You're making this Massachusetts teacher proud.