L’accès des filles à l’enseignement supérieur au Burkina Faso: choix parentaux,parcours d’étudiantes et défis

Girls’ access to higher education in Burkina Faso: parental choices, student trajectories, challenges – What motivates parents from less well-off backgrounds to invest in extended schooling for their daughters? What drives the girls from these backgrounds to stay in the school system up to university level? Many studies on Burkina Faso’s education system show that there are still disparities between girls and boys at all levels, with the gap widening as the level of studies gets higher. Under these conditions, the prospect of pursuing higher education is less certain for girls from less well-off families. Yet, girls from these backgrounds are relatively present at the University of Ouagadougou. Based on a qualitative survey of students and their parents, this article highlights the social rationale determining the specific educational trajectories of these girls. The level of schooling of the older siblings, the girl’s positon in relation to her siblings, or concern for equity are factors in some parents’ decision to enrol their daughters in school. Parents invoke several reasons to justify sending their daughters to university, one of the most frequent being the argument that their daughters faithfully help them in return. As for the students, they mention various motivations to explain why they have persisted with their schooling and university studies, often in difficult circumstances, notably the desire to help their parents. The article also highlights the importance of family support as a factor in girls attending school and university, as well as in the pursuit and success of their studies.     

Excluded girls: interpersonal,institutional and structural violence in schooling

School exclusion and violence are defined with boys as the reference point and relatively little attention is given to the various forms of exclusion—disciplinary exclusion, self‐exclusion and withdrawal from learning—to which girls are subject. Girls in difficulty at school receive less attention than their male peers from policy‐makers, teachers and researchers. They find it more difficult to access resources. The concept of exclusion needs to be expanded to encompass girls’ experiences. This paper explores the policy context in which girls’ exclusion occurs and examines contributory factors, arguing that together they constitute systemic violence. Forms of violence include verbal abuse, psychological violence and the everyday “incivilities” which often go unchallenged in school cultures. The paper draws on research which privileged student voices and considered them alongside those of service providers, to analyse girls’ school experiences, examining violence and exclusion at interpersonal, institutional and structural levels. Issues such as bullying, self‐exclusion, learning difficulties, peer relationships, teacher–student relationships and student pregnancies are considered.     

Gender and Science in the Swedish Compulsory School

This study investigates how Swedish pupils meet chemistry, physics and technology in compulsory school. It explores girls' and boys' actions in and thoughts about these subjects during grades 7 to 9. The pupils come from different worlds determined by gender and social background. In the classroom girls are given, and take upon themselves, the role of keeping lessons together, while boys' attempts to dominate the public arena create disorder. Girls and boys prefer different subject areas. Boys have a practical while girls have a more theoretical approach to science. Girls seek ‘connected knowledge’, and even the successful girls question their understanding. Girls who take an interest in physics and chemistry often have supporting scientist fathers or at least parents with a higher education. Technology is rejected by all girls. The mutual construction and reconstruction of gender and of science/technology contribute to gendered choices of study programmes in upper secondary school.     

Girls in education: citizenship,agency and emotions

Education has been expected to maintain status quo through regulation of citizens, but also to contribute to social change and emancipation. In a collective ethnographic project we have proposed that these contradictions manifest themselves in everyday life at school through tensions between control and agency. Girls encounter practices whereby their use of space is curtailed, their embodiment is controlled and their voice is frequently considered inappropriate. Limitations encountered by girls when striving for independent individuality and citizenship generate a range of emotions. Girls enter educational spaces with the expectation of attaining rational individuality as learners. They often bestow great expectations on schooling and long to attain the position of an abstract independent individual and a citizen capable of exercising agency. In this process they enter a ‘transpositional’ space that frequently reminds them of their gender, as Victoria Foster suggests. The analysis is based on an ethnographic study and subsequent life history interviews on transitions of girls in ethnography.     

Engaging school personnel in making schools safe for girls in Botswana,Malawi, and Mozambique

Girls are vulnerable to HIV in part because the social systems in which they live have failed to protect them. This study evaluates a program aimed at making schools safe for girl learners in order to reduce girls’ vulnerability to HIV in Botswana, Malawi, and Mozambique. In addition to an extensive process evaluation with school personnel program participants, program facilitators, and community members, a cross-sectional post-intervention survey was conducted among adolescent girls in the three countries. The total sample size was 1249 adolescent girls (ages 11–18). Bivariate and multilevel, multivariate analyses were conducted to assess the association between school participation in the intervention and a decrease in teachers offering sex in exchange for academic favors. In Botswana, girls who attended an intervention school, as compared to girls who attended a non-intervention school, were significantly more likely to report a reduction in teachers offering sex in exchange for favors. Communication interventions that both challenge and empower school personnel to create safer environments for schoolgirls can have positive effects, particularly in settings with sufficient resources to support change.     

A Cloistered Ethos? Landscapes of Learning and English Secondary Schools for Girls: an Historical Perspective

The nineteenth‐century founders of academic girls’ secondary schools in England often used an existing building, frequently a former dwelling‐house, adding to it as resources increased and curricula developed, before moving to a purpose‐built school as the venture prospered. As municipal secondary schools for girls developed in England in the wake of the 1902 Education Act, and girls’ grammar schools flourished in the wake of the 1944 Act, new buildings were increasingly provided. The newer state‐maintained schools drew on longer‐standing patterns in the siting of girls’ schools related to both gender and class, which saw schools sited in former stately homes, around rail and bus networks, and in ‘healthy’ locations. The paper analyses entries in the Girls’ School Yearbook from 1906 to 1995, to demonstrate the ‘healthy’ siting of many girls’ schools on the brow of a hill. Well into the second half of the twentieth century, the height of a school’s position above sea level and the type of soil on which the school was built were frequently cited as significant features, taking pride of place before the aims of the school, its curriculum, examination and admission policy. For many state‐educated girls today, longstanding Victorian and Edwardian concerns that girls’ education was detrimental to health have a legacy in a trudge up hills in all weathers as the prelude to a day’s academic work at school.     

Doing Harm in the Name of Protection: Menstruation as a topic for sex education

Pubertal changes in girls and boys are treated differently in school materials in New Zealand. Girls are taught about menstruation in a scientific manner oriented towards reproduction, hygiene and personal stress. Boys receive more positive information about 'exciting' and 'powerful' bodily changes which they can enjoy. The picture of growing up which girls receive is relatively bleak, and is out of touch with the realities of their own lives and those of adult women around them. By attempting to protect girls and society at large from the problems associated with menstruation, schools risk damaging girls' self-image, their conceptions of their roles in society, and their development of positive attitudes towards their bodies and their sexuality.     

Problematic students of NASP‐approved programs: An exploratory study of graduate student views

This study reports the findings of an electronic exploratory survey of National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) Student Representatives. The purpose of the survey was to gather information about the perspective of graduate students concerning problematic peers and their experiences with them in school psychology training programs. Findings suggest that (a) students are unsure whether or not their training programs have an official procedure in place for dealing with problematic students; (b) the problems they observe most commonly involve poor interpersonal skills; (c) consistent with other mental health programs, school psychology graduate students most often talk with their peers or avoid contact with the problematic peer when they have concerns rather than go to faculty; (d) the majority (49.4%) of the respondents feel that faculty or training directors have the most responsibility for the identification of problematic peers but that students have an ethical duty to provide information to the teaching staff if they feel they have a reason to believe there is a problem of which the faculty is unaware. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

论优雅的女中音乐教育

上海市市三女中是一所百年老校,培养过许多知名、优雅的女性。上海市市三女中的音乐教育活动在“优雅的女生教育”中扮演着非常重要的角色,培养女生的优雅是其目标,更是一个过程。根据学生的素养和要求,设计出富有特色的女生音乐教育教学活动,为优雅的女生教育搭建平台,提供保证。     

Short Book Notices

In this paper I compare talk about class and gender by public‐school girls (who classified themselves as upper class and whose parents are in socio‐economic class I and/or are landowners) and comprehensive‐school girls whose parents are in socio‐economic class III. The comprehensive‐school girls had no clear concepts or categorisation of their own class position. Girls in both schools shared a diagnosis and set of grievances about the injustices and dilemmas of girlhood. However, the extent to which they used feminist categories and their contentment with these categories varied markedly — the public‐school girls being notably more uncomfortable. I analyse and theorise these differences as discursive, rather than psychological or purely sociological. This analysis highlights the importance of self‐conscious and critical discursive practice by educators and pupils in the educational setting.     

“… We have learnt not just to sit back,twiddle our thumbs and let them take over.” Single‐sex settings and the development of a pedagogy for girls and a pedagogy for boys in Danish schools

Teachers in the Danish co‐educational elementary school system (the ‘folkeskole’ with pupils from 7 to 16 years) who are involved in innovative pedagogical projects have used segregation as an organisational method in introducing and developing equal opportunities and anti‐sexist pedagogical initiatives. The idea of arranging single‐sex settings started out as a means to provide space for girls and to enhance their competence professionally as well as to empower them personally. In setting up ‘Project Girls’ Class—Boys’ Class’, an ongoing developmental project about gender equity, the teachers, a woman and a man, have mixed their two classes and segregated the girls and the boys for longer or shorter periods or for a whole term in certain subjects, thus giving them space and tutoring on their own terms. It started in 1987/88, when the pupils were 10‐11 years old. Here for the first time they were segregated for 2 months. The involved girls developed self‐confidence and prefer to be in their girls‐only setting whereas it is the teachers (more than the involved boys themselves) that find that the boys’ class can provide important learning experiences for boys in raising their awareness of values and attitudes—both among the boys themselves and in relation to the girls. From the point of view of educational theory and how learning can become true learning, affecting the cognitive, emotional as well as moral and behaviourial attitudes, the paper reflects on why the segregation projects have given such clear results, whereas much other excellent tutoring by committed teachers seems not to have had the same impact. It comes to the preliminary conclusion that, in the hands of devoted teachers (people committed to the issues of gender equity and anti‐sexism and who are close to their pupils) the technique of polarising can be very effective.     

The Civil Service Examination: China's Examination Hell

Competition for a chance to take the civil service examinations began, if we may be allowed to exaggerate only a little, even before birth. On the back of many a lady's copper mirror the five-character formula, "Five Sons Pass the Examinations," expressed her heart's desire to bear five successful sons. Girls, since they could not take the examinations and become officials but merely ran up dowry expenses, were no asset to a family; a man who had no sons was considered to be childless. People said that thieves warned each other not to enter a household with five or more girls because there would be nothing to steal in it. The luckless parents of girls hoped to make up for such misfortune in the generation of their grandchildren by sending their daughters into marriage equipped with those auspicious mirrors.     

Education policy and gender in Zimbabwe

It is concluded that equality for women in education, which was a state aim in 1980, is no longer a state concern in Zimbabwe. It is argued that protection of the patriarchal order has been the operating principle of both colonial and post-colonial periods, and education is used to maintain the gender imbalance. Black women under colonialism were subjected to both sexism and racism. The socioeconomic order was maintained by ensuring that Blacks remained uneducated and unskilled. Colonial policy was race specific. Education was free and compulsory for Whites only. Black parents paid fees for a son's education. Post colonialism and in 1971, only 43.5% of Black children were enrolled in school, of which 3.9% were in secondary school. Only 19 girls with at the highest level in school. School curriculum was gender based, which meant girls were taught cooking and typing. During independence, education policy was instituted, and education was considered as a human right and gender neutral. Tuition fees in primary grades were eliminated, and education was expanded. However, changes after independence did not result in equal advantage for girls. By 1985-91, girls had lower enrollments at all grade levels. The widest gaps in enrollment were at the highest levels. School curriculum changed very little, and girls were directed to the "feminine" courses of study. Girls performed poorly in math and sciences. Girls were underenrolled in technical and vocational institutions. After 1989, structural adjustment programs negatively impacted on women. There was reduced access to employment, limited access to services, and increased demands on women's time in order to compensate for gaps created by cuts in services. New changes in education policy are expected to negatively impact on girl's education. Fees for primary school were reintroduced in urban areas, and secondary school fees were increased. The government dropped the requirement of certification for technical and commercial education, which could benefit the 64% of women employed in the informal sector. Export-oriented adjustment programs relied on cheap, low-skilled female employees.     

Class,honour and reputation: gendered school choice practices in a migrant community

In this paper, I draw on a qualitative study of Iraqi-born Muslim mothers in Australia exploring how they navigate choosing secondary schools for their daughters. While the mothers interviewed for this study agreed on the importance of education and its role in facilitating upward social mobility for all their children, they articulated a specific and more complex set of concerns in relation to selecting schools for their daughters. This article suggests that families’ positions in the Australian diasporic Iraqi community are tied to girls’ schooling and, therefore, school choices are heavily gendered and contribute to a gendered structuring of family and community life. By analysing the narratives of Iraqi-born mothers, a deeper understanding emerges of the complex and varied outlooks of migrant Muslim parents on education and gender in their everyday practices of raising and educating their daughters.     

Reconsidering Schools and the American Welfare State

Recalling her experience as an exchange teacher in Birmingham, England, in 1938–39, in the midst of the Great Depression, Oregon teacher Mary Kelly, wrote: When I witnessed the first‘leaving’day … in one of the Birmingham schools and learned that as soon as the majority of the English children were fourteen they were through with regular schooling forever, I almost shed tears. “Do you mean that those girls will never go to high school?” I asked. “Yes it is true.” ”Will they have jobs or will they be idle?” “The Education Department will place most of them in positions in homes, shops or factories ….” There were no graduation exercises, no lovely new dresses, no parents or relatives invited. I thought of my high‐school graduation, which possibly would never have been if education was not free, because the means were limited. Still another graduation after going through college on nothing a year permitted me to take up teaching ….To me, at that moment, there was nothing more precious than democracy and I mean the American way.¹     

Parental Choice and Schooling: some factors influencing Muslim mothers’ decisions about the education of their daughters

In recent years parental choice in education has become an important focus of political debate. Muslim demands for the state funding of Islamic schools have attracted a significant amount of media attention, with opposition sometimes coming from those who argue that such schools are likely to offer limited opportunities to pupils, particularly girls. This article reports on a small‐scale research project which examined the attitudes and values of Muslim women in the UK to their daughters’ education, particularly the basis on which they had selected either a private Islamic school or state primary school. It considers whether the concept of parental choice is a valid one for these women     

The Compoicabed love in The Joy Luck Club

In The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan told1 the story of the four Chinese mothers2 who were Chinese immigrants to the United States and their four American-born daughters. One of the hardships the immigrants3 suffered as they assimilated into American culture was the conflicts4 between mothers and daughters which were caused by their generation gap and growing background5. However, the complicated love between them impressed me a lot.     

少数民族贫困地区大龄女童辍学问题追踪研究

近几年,少数民族贫困地区女童教育研究转向了对大龄女童(10～12岁)辍学问题及辍学的多因素综合治理方面.少数民族大龄女童辍学率高,主要原因是她们已经成为家里的劳动力或后备劳动力,通过她们的劳动或外出打工来支撑贫困的家庭及继续弟妹的学业.农村实行"两免一补"政策后,这一问题有了一定的缓解,但不能从根本上解决.为此,建议通过设立民族教育发展专项基金或发展特区的政策,从根本上解决民族教育的这一难点问题.     

Effects of social class and school conditions on educational enrollment and achievement of boys and girls in rural Viet Nam

This study examines the effects of parental SES, school quality, and community factors on children's enrollment and achievement in rural areas in Viet Nam, using logistic regression and ordered logistic regression. Multivariate analysis reveals significant differences in educational enrollment and outcomes by level of household expenditures and parental education, especially mother's education. Mother's status is more important in determining school enrollment than educational outcome. In contrast, father's education increases the probability of learning. Once school quality is taken into account, differentials between the majority Kinh and ethnic minorities are not significant. Girls still do not have equal access to education, since girls doing badly in school drop out, while their male counterparts remain in school. The presence of a school in poor village does not override the effects of family background on educational enrollment. Controlling for school quality actually increases gap in educational enrollment by household expenditures and village income. Although educational costs consume, on average, one quarter of household expenditures per capita, school fees do not determine school enrollment, because many of the poor already receive exemption from or reduction in these fees.     

学习效能感在高中生班级环境与 学习动机间的中介效应

为考察高中生学习效能感在班级环境与学习动机间的中介效应,采用学习动机、学 习效能感和班级环境问卷调查403名高中生.结果表明:(1)女生威信动机高于男生;男生 学习效能感高于女生;师生关系一年级好于二年级,女生好于男生;(2)学习动机与师生关 系、竞争、基本能力感和控制感正相关;基本能力感与秩序纪律负相关,与同学关系和控制 感正相关;控制感除学习压力外,与班级环境其他维度正相关.(3)基本能力感在秩序纪律 和学习动机间具有中介作用,控制感在竞争和学习动机间具有中介效应.高中生学习动机 的激发与维持的关键是提高学生的学习效能感,适当的竞争环境与相对民主、自由的班级 氛围有利于学生学习效能感的提高.