Abstract
This chapter sets out the policy background behind attempts to encourage women to enter gender-segregated areas of work in England. It then considers factors within individuals themselves and within the work environment that facilitate or, conversely, inhibit attempts to encourage women to move into gender-segregated occupations. The chapter also examines current funding policies in England and considers whether these support or inhibit attempts to encourage women to re-train and gain high-level qualifications in atypical, gender segregated, areas.
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Notes
- 1.
BIS has had responsibility since its inception in June 2009. Between June 2007 and June 2009 responsibility for this policy area lay with the Department of Innovation, Universities and Skills (DIUS) and before that the Department for Education and Skills (DfES).
- 2.
Although this finally seems to be changing: Trends in ‘A’ (Advanced) level results reveal that females are gradually increasing their share of science ‘A’ levels; data are available from the UK Resource Centre for Women (www.setwomenresource.org.uk).
- 3.
The Equal Opportunities Commission has statutory powers under the Sex Discrimination Act to instigate a General Formal Investigation where there is prevalent gender segregation in employment and training; the work looked at employment, education and training in five strongly segregated areas, but looked in particular at the situation regarding apprenticeships.
- 4.
Although this appears not to be the case in males, for whom if anything, rigidity with regard to career choice seems to be a problem that is more ‘set in stone’ than amongst females.
- 5.
Or, indeed, men: the same hurdles outlined in this section apply equally to men seeking to change career direction.
- 6.
Conflicting policies often lead to funding being inadequate to achieve all Government targets. Although the Government is keen to raise the number of individuals with level 3 qualifications , a seemingly greater priority in recent years has been to reduce the number of young people (those aged under 19) not in education , employment or training (NEET). This has led to a prioritisation of funding for under 19Â s, along with a consequent curtailment of funding for those aged over 19. Although the Government announced changes to funding for older people in 2007, this has had very little impact ; this is discussed at the end of the chapter.
- 7.
Although there are signs very recently (2009) that the rules regarding this point are starting to be applied less stringently now.
- 8.
Or the older GCE ‘O’ levels and Certificate of Secondary Education (CSEs); all of these are considered ‘equivalent’ to a level 2 award.
- 9.
Some limited funding is available for unemployed people through Job Centre Plus, albeit with restrictions.
- 10.
Part of DfES became DCSF while part became DIUS, now BIS.
- 11.
And indeed, the outcomes of the IES work includes a toolkit that can be used by education providers to help them design taster sessions in a way that ensures they will attract a more diverse group of young people. The toolkit is available as a free download at: http://www.employment-studies.co.uk/pubs/summary.php?id=444&page=2.
- 12.
Since the PAQ was introduced Spence and her colleagues have revised their views so that now, the PAQ is conceptualised as measuring ‘gender differentiating personality traits’ rather than sex-role stereotyping per se, with the gender differentiating dimensions being labelled ‘instrumentality’ and ‘expressivity’. Recent assessments (e.g., see Miller et al. 2000b) indicate the scale still has validity in differentiating between males and females, with males on average continuing to assess themselves as more ‘instrumental’ (originally the ‘masculine’ dimension) than do females, while females continue to assess themselves on average as more ‘expressive’ (originally the ‘feminine’ dimension) than do males.
- 13.
And, in fact, the same is true of ‘feminine’ stereotyped men, although generally speaking these constitute a very small sub-group.
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Acknowledgements
I would like to thank my colleagues Jim Hillage, Becci Newton and Marie Strebler for helpful discussions on this chapter.
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Miller, L. (2011). Women Work-Based Learners: Factors Affecting Lifelong Learning and Career Opportunities. In: Jackson, S., Malcolm, I., Thomas, K. (eds) Gendered Choices. Lifelong Learning Book Series, vol 15. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-0647-7_9
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