Gender and Education

     When asked to think about the classes that I am in and see if any of them are gendered in one way or another, I thought for a while and for the most part came up with that the school is pretty good at being equal and not gender discriminating. However, I do have classes that have more females in them. I think that could most likely reflect my major and kinda shows that it is mostly females that go into the Alternative medicine / Integrative Therapeutic Therapies field. That makes me a little curious to why that is, however, there are definitely some males that are in that major that I have connected with throughout different classes, just not a lot of them. For example, in my Homeopathy class right now, there is only one male, I think sometimes he feels overrun by females in the class but I do notice our teacher trying to be fair to him. I also have noticed that in this class (Gender and Communication). The class has a lot of discussion in it and I often feel it is very feminist and kind of leaves the few males in our class to feeling like a minority. I do think that Dr. McCarver does try to make an effort to have them express their feelings on the subjects to give a different perspective that might not be visible to an all female class. 
     While reading the chapter in, Gendered Lives, I had some very interesting realizations and understanding about how education and gender plays together. I for the most part thought that it was a main part of schools to represent a gender equality and be somewhat of a role model. One thing I did find really interesting is how they present early education from preschool to elementary school to be described as an "primarily feminine environment". They explain that not only female adults out number male adults but also the environment is more comfortable for girls because its easier for them to sit and be quiet and attentive, where as boys seem to have restless energy and have hard time sitting and paying attention. This really got me thinking. I thought about my little brother and sister that are only a year younger and how they act and handle different situations. Its true, I have noticed my little sister can sit, be quiet and restless where as my brother will sit and be kicking his legs, twitlling his thumbs and looking around for anything fun in the room that might be going on. The book also mentions a term, effortless perfection. They refer to it as, women feeling the need to be perfect in the means of looks, smarts, fit, and accomplished without any effort. This I feel is something that is definitely present throughout all schools and happens for most women to feel they need to do this. I think it might just be a cultural thing. I feel not to many other cultures have the same underlying idea of how women are considered and want to feel and play the part of being successful as much.
       As for talk on the single sex educational programs I don't agree with them. I can see how they could possibly be good and supportive of the idea that males and females learn to do things at different times and by separating them it would allow to target in on the individual and their appropriate learning speed. I also think it might be good for the reason, that maybe genders get distracted being in classes with others that they could have some form of sexual energy for someone, which could distract the learning procedure and what they could be getting out of the class. Some females even might fall into that 'cult of romance'.  However, I am definitely against single sex education. I do agree with critics that all schools should be supportive to both genders learning needs. I grew up in schooling with males and I believe it was for the better. Otherwise, I feel I might not know how to act appropriately around males and might think that I was different and have negative or feelings of not being equal to males.
     Overall, I think it is a very interesting topic and I learned a lot of different points and understandings about genders in school and the differences. I think it will be a fun thing to have in your mind in the future when in classes. I am excited to see how this is in some of my more upper division classes for my major and see if they are formed for women or are more gender equal and its just not a common major for males to have.