JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN SCIENCE TEACHING VOL. 39, NO. 8, PP. 659–663 (2002)

EDITORIAL

Where is Gender and Equity in Science Education?

In their editorial ‘‘Glimpses at our history as the century closes’’ (1999), James Gallagher

and Charles Anderson found that the substantive issues in science education over the past

century did not include issues of gender, race, class, or ethnicity. This prompted me to ask the

following question: ‘‘Where is gender and equity in science education?’’ To answer this

question, I took a historical approach, and I used articles and editorials that have appeared in the

Journal of Research in Science Teaching (JRST ) with the decade of the 1970s as a starting point.

Because contributors to all science education journals come from essentially the same pool of

scholars, I did not feel that limiting an examination to JRST would constitute a bias.

I started by examining articles and editorials, decade by decade, that addressed planning for

the future, setting priorities, establishing a research agenda, and describing our theoretical

orientation as well as articles that took gender and equity as their main theme. These articles

represent efforts by scholars, considered leaders in the field by many, to influence the direction of

science education.

The first article to appear was written by Paul DeHart Hurd (Hurd, 1971). He criticized

science education research for lacking a theoretical framework. He wryly pointed out that

Flechter Watson made the same criticism of science education a decade earlier. Hurd felt that the

emphasis on facts and numbers at the expense of explaining relationships did not allow us to

speak authoritatively about educational issues. He also felt that researchers were not asking the

right questions because they were ignoring the interplay of cultural and social factors either

inside or outside the classroom. However, Hurd never addressed gender explicitly nor did he

propose any potentially fruitful theoretical frameworks for the research community to use to

address cultural or social factors.

In 1978, Robert Yager and an all-male committee of science educators wrote a report

presenting the priorities for science education for the next decade. The report did not include any

mention of race, class, culture, or gender among the important student characteristics for

researchers to consider. Also, in 1978, a Delphi study of the National Association of Research in

Science Teaching membership indicated that the membership felt 35 research priorities should

be pursued. Gender was not addressed specifically, but Concern 27 was for the ‘‘Development of

alternative strategies for students with special problems—e.g., EMR, bi-lingual, culturally

DOI 10.1002/tea.10044

Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com).

� 2002 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

deprived, non-readers, minorities, etc.’’ (Butts, Capie, Fuller, May, & Yeany, 1978, p. 112). Most

research concerns were practical and applied; that is, emphasizing needs assessment and

identification of variables of assumed importance.

In 1979, Issue 6 of JRST allocated considerable space to theory and the implications of

theory to science education research. These theories were reception learning (Novak, 1979),

hierarchical learning (Jones & Russell, 1979), and developmental learning (Lawson, 1979).

These theories were about innate cognitive characteristics of learners such as abstract reasoning

or competencies, or they focused on structural characteristics of material to be learned, such as

the appropriate sequencing or the selection of concepts. Nowhere in the articles was there a hint

that barriers to learning science could reside in social inequities or gender roles. In the two

articles that followed, neither Carl Burger (1979) nor Rita Peterson (1979) addressed the absence

of the consideration of social inequities or gender roles in their discussions of the implications

and impact of these theories on research in science education.

Consequently, it should come as no surprise that there was little research during the 1970s

and early 1980s that addressed gender or equity. During this time approximately 12 studies in-

dicated in their titles that gender was the primary focus of the research. Most of these studies

were about sex differences or used sex as a correlate of some kind of cognitive ability deemed

critical to success in science. These studies were either psychological in orientation and used

White male performance as the benchmark, or lacked explicit theoretical frameworks. However,

they did share an implicit framework. They were conducted under what I call the ‘‘My Fair

Lady’’ framework, or ‘‘Why can’t a woman be more like a man?’’ When there were differences

or correlates, the White male model was the right model.

The late 1980s was the beginning of both more sophisticated and less mechanistic theories

of learning and teaching and an explicit concern for girls and learners from lower socioeconomic

groups. This change arose, in part, out of a National Science Foundation (NSF)-sponsored

conference at Lawrence Hall of Science (Linn, 1987). Yet, despite Marcia Linn’s description of

the participants of the conference that included sociologists, anthropologists, and philosophers,

in addition to the usual scientists, teachers, science educators, and psychologists, the

recommendations were timid. Meeting the needs of diverse populations and respecting the

perspectives of women, Latinos, African Americans, and members of other cultures was

couched in terms of depth versus breadth of content; developing metacognitive strategies for a

strong sense of self; curriculum based on the nature of learning, integration across subject areas,

and the STS (Science Technology and Society) model; greater use of technology; and a new

view of teaching. All of these are excellent recommendations but lack the punch of a strong

sociological or feminist perspective.

In the late 1980s there was an increase in articles centrally concerned with gender (n� 20).

The focus on sex differences diminished and gender and equity were beginning to creep into

titles with greater frequency. Scholars began to question what, if anything, gender differences on

cognitive and achievement tests meant, and they began to explore how to get more girls

interested in science. Scholars were concerned with the effects of role models, persuasive

arguments, stereotypes in textbooks, and creating gender-fair classrooms. The psychological

perspective still held sway, and no one was yet questioning whether the so-called problem of

girls and science had less to do with the nature of girls and more to do with the nature of science.

The 1990s brought a focus on fixing school science by employing more girl-friendly

instructional strategies, topics, and curriculum, as well as gender-fair assessments. Fixing

science was seen as a way to interest girls in science, address the science dropout rate, and deal

with the marginalization of women scientists (Curtin, Blake, & Cassagnau, 1997; NSF, 1997a,

1997b; Scholer, 1998).

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The 1990s also represented a breakthrough in terms of the official recognition that gender is

a crucial issue in science education. Official recognition manifested itself in the stance taken by

editors of JRST, as seen in special issues dedicated to gendered concerns and research and reform

recommendations. At the end of the 1990s, approximately 30 articles in JRST addressed gender

issues. Although some research continued to look at differences or used gender as a correlate,

new perspectives emerged. Fewer articles stopped at reporting phenomena and more tried to

explain what the phenomena meant. Furthermore, feminist and emancipatory frameworks and

methodologies were explicitly addressed.

At the same time that gender was becoming legitimate, race, class, culture, and linguistic

issues were also making a similar breakthrough in the science education literature. In Issue 8 of

JRST in 1992, James Shymansky and William Kyle wrote an article titled ‘‘Establishing a

research agenda: Critical issues of science curriculum reform. Shymansky and Kyle criticized

science education research that was conducted in a context that perpetuated the social,

economic, and political ideologies of the dominant culture. They encouraged science educators

to consider gender, race, ethnicity, economic status, and religion as factors in science education

research and reform. However, no recommendations were provided for the thorny problem

of when and how to examine gender, race, ethnicity, economic status, and religion together,

or when and how to examine them separately. Thus, we find that although Michael Apple

(1992) wrote about economic oppression and curriculum reform, he never mentioned

the special effect economic oppression has for women. In addition, Michael O’Loughlin

(1992) wrote about issues of culture, power, and discourse in the classroom as well as the

development of a sociocultural model of teaching and learning. However, this was only in

relation to students of color, as if the research on gendered classroom interactions had never

taken place.

Gerald Krockover and Daniel Shepardson recognized the problem and complexities of

dealing with gender in a multiplicity of contexts in their editorial that appeared in Issue 3 of

JRST in 1995. They called for including ‘‘the missing links’’ in gender research—that is, issues

of race, ethnicity, class, and sociocultural identity—to better understand the barriers to women’s

participation in science. Publications in JRST in the years spanning the new century indicate that

other researchers have begun to be concerned about the missing links, too. In the fourth and

eighth JRST issues of 1998, authors tackled head-on the exploration of gender issues and

marginalization from critical, feminist, and poststructuralist frameworks. On the other hand, in

Issue 3 of JRST in 1999, a special issue on science education in developing countries, culture was

almost the exclusive focus. Only two articles briefly mention the impact of traditional culture for

girls’ access to science although many of the cultures examined place women and girls in

subordinate positions to men and boys.

In Issue 4 of JRST in 2000, Mary Atwater wrote a short piece in the Comments and Criticism

section, entitled ‘‘Females in science education: White is the norm and class, language, lifestyle,

and religion are nonissues.’’ Her piece was followed by replies from Randy McGinnis, Leonie

Rennie, and Elaine Howes. All of the authors struggled to avoid oversimplification. For example,

they acknowledged the problem of looking at gender alone as if the issues for White females

were the same as those for African American or Latino females; they also recognized

the problem of assuming that the issues of middle-class females are the same as the issues for

those who are less well off economically. On the other hand, all of the authors were aware of the

problem of certain groups losing their voice—that is, having the issues of gender subsumed by

ethnicity, or issues of language subsumed by class.

Issues 8, 9, and 10 of JRST in 2001 addressed urban education and the implications for

equity that urban education implies. These articles did not shy away from the complex

EDITORIAL 661

interactions of gender, class, and race. Language and culture were also examined in Issue 5 of the

same year. These are good trends, but still seem to be limited to special issues and a small cadre

of scholars. Whether the new century brings a broader awareness of the importance of gender

and equity issues remains to be seen. Perhaps the changing demographics of American schools

and the increased immigration of people from poorer nations to industrialized nations worldwide

will bring a greater awareness of the importance of gender and equity issues in science

education. Or perhaps a new theory will bring gender, class, language, culture, religion, and

ethnicity to the forefront of science education. For now, I leave it up to the reader to answer the

question, ‘‘Where are gender and equity in science education?’’

Dale Baker

Editor

References

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Butts, D., Capie, W., Fuller, E., May, D., & Yeany, R. (1978). Priorities for research

in science education: A Delphi study. Journal of Research in Science Teaching, 2, 109–

114.

Curtin, J., Blake, G., & Cassagnau, C. (1997). The climate for women graduate students in

physics. Journal of Women and Minorities in Science and Engineering, 3, 95–117.

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