Move over boys it’s the girls turn
I have just been doing an entomology course, in our course there were about twelve of us, out of that there were three guys. You might think ‘wow so many girls learning entomology’! However I think that out of nine of us only two girls will continue in entomology and out of the three guys two will definitely continue in the field of entomology. And if you look deeper into the field of entomology the percentage of guys is much higher than the girls. So is there a reason for this?
In 2004, a study was done in America to find out just that, it showed that even if girls were interested in the field of science at school by the time they left educational training they didn’t end up following the career path of science. Forty-six percent of women were in the work force, however only twenty-six percent of women were in the field of science and engineering.
While training as a primary teacher I noted that science was lacking in many schools (primary). The study showed that as girls get older in primary school girls started to lose interest in science and by the time, they got to high school they had lost interest and the percentage males increased in studying science and maths. An interesting comment was made that perhaps the reason for this is there is a lack of female role models in science. In addition, when I started reflecting on this in relation to New Zealand it is very true, as males tend to dominate fronting for science programmes. Don’t get me wrong there are female scientist but in the eye of the public they tend to be males.
Yanowtiz and Vanderpool(2004) completed two types of studies to find out what students thought about what scientist did, fifty-six percent thought that scientist engaged in some type of general, nonspecific study or learning; thirty- four percent thought that scientist focused on specific items and techniques and sixteen percent thought that scientist help people.
So is it lack of understanding in the earlier stages of schooling that girls start losing interest in science? In America, they have developed a programme to encourage girls to consider science as a career. They suggest that girls start to doubt their ability in science in the later stages of primary school (Yanowtiz and Vanderpool,2004).
I was lucky enough to go into my son’s intermediate school and show the students how to mount and pin an insect. The boys just loved it however the girls stated to scream, make a number of comments such as yuck and run away. However once they got over tha,t they started to become interested in what I was doing and they were asking a number of questions. I made a comment to the teacher that I was very surprised in the girl’s reaction.
So does it really come down to the fact that New Zealand doesn’t teach enough science in primary school at a younger age? Do children especially girls realise that science can be rewarding, stimulating, interesting challenging the list goes on. From what I have read thought my other blogs and what I have seen while training to become a teacher, it really comes down to the fact that a lot of teachers and schools think that science is too hard to teach and they don’t realise that science can be integrated into other curriculum areas. Do we need to follow America and have female scientist going into schools to teach science in all shapes and forms showing girls that they could enter into the work force as a scientist(hopefully in entomology).
Karen L. Yanowitz and Staria S. Vanderpool(2004)Assessing Girls' Reactions to Science Workshops Journal of Science Education and Technology Volume 13, Number 3, 353-359, DOI: 10.1023/B:JOST.0000045462.08497.1c
