Threshold assessment and performance management: modernizing or masculinizing teaching in England?1

Abstract

A tradition of predominately feminist literature has revealed that there is a 'missing discourse of desire' in many sex education programmes. Building on this work, this article explores the gendered effects of this de-eroticized and clinical form of education. It is argued that young women and men's (hetero)sexual subjectivities are differentially affected by the invisibility of desire and pleasure in this curriculum. To offer young women a sense of personal empowerment and entitlement, and young men a broader range of (hetero)sexual subjectivities, it is proposed that sex education include a discourse of erotics. This would comprise more than an acknowledgement of desire and pleasure and incorporate the embodied practicalities of these experiences. As a means of developing this discourse within sexuality programmes, empirical evidence of 17-to 19-year-olds' experiences of desire and pleasure are examined.

Becoming a secondary school teacher in England and France: contextualising career ‘choice’

“…Australia and the USA), educational policies have attempted to 'remasculinise' teaching and, in some cases, to associate it with the characteristics of hegemonic masculinity (Mahony et al 2004;Mendick 2012). A less 'feminine' construction of teaching in the French context may explain why male teachers from working-class and other socio-economic backgrounds did not mention such difficulties.…”

“…So he was dubious to start, but now I think, well he sees that I've built up and I'm driving a decent car and living in a nice place, et cetera, so he's quite happy now about the job I'm actually doing. (Matthew) Matthew's narrative needs to be read in conjunction with a view of teaching as a profession which, in the English context, has sometimes been culturally constructed as 'feminine' through its association with care, although most work highlights how a technicist and managerial approach to teaching has been increasingly favoured at policy level (Mahony and Hextall 2000;Mahony, Hextall, and Menter 2004). This discourse of teaching as a caring profession has been historically associated with primary teaching, as well as, to a lesser extent, with secondary school teaching.…”

Usages et conceptions des organisations syndicales chez les enseignants du second degré : une comparaison France-Angleterre

“…Le déficit de confiance dont ce groupe professionnel souffrirait et les contraintes d' « imputabilité » (accountability) qui en résultent sont des thèmes largement développés dans la sociologie de l'éducation anglo-saxonne (Ball, 1999 ;Mahony et Hextall, 2000, 2001Mahony et al, 2004). Si ce phéno-mène n'est pas nouveau (Broadfoot et Osborn, 1993), il est exacerbé par deux éléments : d'une part, l'introduction par les gouvernements conservateurs, au cours des années 1980, des principes du New Public Management dans le secteur scolaire (Normand, 2011), politique reprise par les gouvernements travaillistes et poursuivie par la coalition entre libéraux-démocrates et conservateurs au pouvoir depuis 2010 ; d'autre part, l'érosion, au cours de la même période, du pouvoir des syndicats.…”

New Labour, new leaders? Gendering transformational leadership

“…A number of critical commentators have highlighted the ways in which these principles are deeply gendered, resulting in what many regard as a 'masculinisation' of education (Mac an Ghaill, 1994;Blackmore, 1999;Skelton, 2002;Mahony et al, 2004a;Mills et al, 2004). This process of masculinisation represents complex developments in the relationship between gender and professionalism, consonant with economic shifts favouring the new 'feminised' skills of the modern workplace over certain features of bureaucratic masculine authority (Kerfoot & Knights, 1996;McDowell, 1997;Blackmore, 1999).…”