Framing gender: Representing male teachers in the Australian and New Zealand press

Abstract

Over the past two decades the issue of gender imbalance in teaching has been the subject of media and political discussion. Researchers have yet to draw definitive conclusions as to the relationship between teacher gender and student achievement, but the notion that more men are needed in teaching persists, with calls for governments to enact ‘affirmative action’ policies. Despite this, surveys of male teachers have found that many believe they are portrayed negatively in the media and that they are under greater scrutiny than their female counterparts. In seeking to better understand this contradiction, this article examines 233 news stories covering the issue of men in teaching. Using framing theory, the authors found that despite a high percentage of stories carrying a positive angle, male teachers are predominantly framed in problematic ways. The authors argue that the news media is ideologically limited in its representation of male teachers, resulting in any advocacy being a counter-narrative to the prevailing logic.

Changing masculinities? Using caring masculinity to analyse social media responses to the decline of men in Australian primary school teaching

“…'Valuable and suspicious': Dominant discourses about men and primary school teaching One challenge that is consistently identified as contributing to the decreasing percentage of male teachers in primary schools is negative societal perceptions of male primary teachers (e.g. Mistry & Sood, 2015;Reid et al, 2019). A common theme is how male primary school teachers struggle with discourses that position them as both valuable and suspicious (Cruickshank, 2012).…”

“…Burn & Pratt-Adams, 2015; Mills et al, 2008) and media coverage (e.g. Cruickshank, 2019; Reid et al, 2019). These findings are supported by studies of female teachers in the United Kingdom (Jones, 2007), and of education stakeholders such as teachers, parents and administrators in Canada (Bernard et al, 2004), which found that all men in the primary teaching profession are perceived as high risk and likely have to deal with constant suspicion and surveillance.…”