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Education major Jonathan Sessions, left, gets seat-of-the-pants
experience as a student-teacher at Midway Heights Elementary
School in Columbia. Rob Hill photo
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New Program Recruits Men to Elementary School Classrooms
By Jeff Neu
Research has shown that since the 1970s, the number of male elementary teachers has significantly dwindled. According to the National Education Association, only 9 percent of elementary teachers are males. The reasons for this decline range from the profession's appearance of being unmanly, to low salaries, to a fear of male teachers being accused of child molestation. A new program in the University of Missouri-Columbia's College of Education is actively recruiting men to rejoin the elementary teaching field.
“There has been, overall, a disturbing lack of male influence in the lives of young children,” said Roy Fox, professor and chair of the MU Department of Learning, Teaching and Curriculum, who is currently developing the program. “Even those few men who do become teachers are often tapped to become principals, so they're pulled from the classroom.”
To illustrate the degree that most people consider female elementary teachers to be the “norm,” Fox recalled an anecdote from the profession: “At the end of the first day of school, a first-grader was asked by her mother what she thought of her new teacher, who the mother knew was a man. 'I don't know,' replied the child, 'my teacher keeps sending her husband.'”
The program, called Men for Excellence in Elementary Teaching (MEET), is seeking to bring in a cohort of the best qualified men who wish to pursue their master's degree in elementary education through the Teaching Fellows Program at MU. Participants would receive a yearly stipend from several education sources, as well as a modified course of study, such as a support seminar focusing on the roles and challenges of men in elementary schools.
Fox said these students also would serve as liaisons to the program bringing in prospective students. Upon graduation, they'd be placed in a supportive school environment. He hopes these incentives will draw men to the program.
“The ultimate goal, of course, is to develop the best teachers possible, regardless of gender,” Fox said. “It's just that there are so few men in elementary classrooms and it's not even a blip on most people's radar screens. Men who might be interested in teaching do not see other men in primary level classrooms, so they do not consider it as a career option. My hope is that this program begins to change this mentality.”
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Last Update:
November 15, 2007
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