Advancing Women in Leadership Journal
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Female Perspectives on Career Advancement
Get PDFThere are current inequalities in the representation of females in higher administrative positions in public schools that are a product of historical and societal patterns. These patterns have determined the constraints women have faced and continue to face when they attempt to enter public school administration. Women represent the majority in the teaching profession and in school administration graduate programs, but are persistently absent from the highest and most powerful administrative positions in public education (Shakeshaft, 1999). The top three administrative posts in public school education (superintendent, assistant superintendent, and high school principal) remain overwhelmingly filled by males (Keller, 1999). According to Mary Hatwood Futurell, former President of the National Education Association, in 2002 only 12 percent of the superintendents are women and just five percent are minorities (AAUW, 2002). This astounding figure is approximately the same as was reported at the turn of the last century
Black Women Teacher Educators, Race Uplift, and the Academic Other-Mother Identity
Get PDFThis paper examines the intersections of teacher educators\u27 identities and the notion of race uplift. It is based on a larger study that explores the experiences and practices of Black women professors at three different higher education institutions. The author maintains that as a result of their outsider-within position and race uplift stance, Black women teacher educators may produce an academic other-mother identity. While considering the concepts of womanist theory, this paper attempts to offer a thick description of the kind of race uplift practiced by teacher educators of color. The author defines the outsider-within position and the historical relationship between the race uplift theme and womanism, reviews current literature about teacher educators of color - highlighting their experiences and how they view their work in the academy, and examines the outsider-within position in Black women teacher educators. The author concludes with a discussion of the other-mother identity and Black women teacher educators.
Research indicates that the experiences of Black women faculty involve racist and sexist practices by colleagues and students. Additionally, these women experience feelings of isolation, discrimination, and tokenism. Collins (1998) cautions that being marginalized in intersections of race, class, gender, sexuality, and/or citizenship places a variety of well-meaning intellectuals engaged in higher education in common border zones, and these same systems of power reproduce hierarchies in "outsider-within locations." Middle class African Americans in the United States, for example, are aggressively recruited to join elite institutions of higher education and other sites of institutional power, only to find themselves, upon arrival, confined to a new designated "place", or "outsider-within location" (Collins, 1998). Professor Annette Henry, also a teacher educator, describes the outsider-within location clearly from personal experience:
Standing like an oak by the photocopier, a White male graduate student utters the only words he has ever said to me during his years in the college of education: "You\u27re lucky you got this job;" he mutters, assuredly, un-stapling a document. "They don\u27t usually hire, well;" he leans toward me and whispers, “outsiders," as if telling me a deep dark secret. (Henry, 1998, p. 5)
That is, they appear to belong, because they possess both the credentials for admittance and the rights of formal citizenship, "but that does not automatically translate into substantive citizenship rights" (Collins, 1998, p. 5). Several Black women scholars have termed the race-, sex-, and class-based oppression they experienced in institutions of higher learning as "double", "triple", or "multiple oppressions" (Anzaldúa, 1998; Guy-Sheftall, 1995; James, 1999; James & Farmer, 1993; King, D., 1993). These terms are meant to suggest the cumulative effect of experiencing, gender, race, and class exploitation (Knight, 1998).
These new spaces that marginalized Black women occupy in the academy, coupled with the possible erosion of activism within teaching due to a growing Black middle class (Collins, 1990), led me to ask questions such as: what is the current relationship between agency and teacher preparation?; in what ways are teaching practices influenced by these new "outsider-within" locations?; and, how do contemporary Black women teacher educators utilize notions of "race uplift" to shape their work?
This paper examines the intersections of teacher educators\u27 outsider within identity and the notion of race uplift. While considering the concepts of womanist theory, it attempts to offer a thick description of race uplift as practiced by Black women teacher educators. It is based on a qualitative investigation of three Black women teacher educators that sought to answer two questions: In what ways do their experiences inform their teaching practice, and how does the notion of race uplift inform their work? The sample was clearly purposive because the goals were to deepen society\u27s understandings of the significant experiences and practices of Black women who prepare teachers for K-12 classrooms
Nora Barlow - A Modern Cambridge Victorian And \u27The Many Lives of Modern Woman\u27
Get PDFThe audience and thesis of a book carry multiple implications for what will follow in the discussion. In reading The many lives of modern woman (Gruenberg and Krech, 1952), I found the authors speaking to a number of issues about which I was concerned. In particular they seemed to offer a kind of subtext to the last chapter of the biography I am writing, Nora Barlow and the Darwin legacy (Smith, In process). If that works out, it is a major discovery or accomplishment. Further, when colleagues Sharon Lee and Kelly McKerrow sent a call for papers on women, leadership, and social justice, I thought the Gruenberg and Krech book spoke not only to the Barlow life but also to the Lee and McKerrow request. My intension and task is the integration of a review of a classic book, and a view and commentary of the life of Nora Barlow, a privileged 19th Century woman. She was well to do and part of the intellectual aristocracy of England. A part of her life concerned the issues of community leadership and for her, at a very personal level, attempts at the resolution of the problems of equality and social justice. Finally in this essay review I present, and try to integrate, a series of more autobiographical comments of the interrelationships between the book and my, and my wife\u27s, personal lives. My hope would be that in accomplishing this complex task I would have a better grasp of several important issues in social science and more personally, how I want to end the biography of Nora Barlow
Exploring Women\u27s Career Development: Implications for Theory and Practice
Get PDFWith a few notable exceptions, most research into the occupational experiences of women is typicallymacro-social and based on large-scale, impersonal, aggregated, and static data. Whilst such data reveal theposition of women in the workforce relative to men, they do not provide sufficient processual insight intothe career development of women. Through a case study approach, this study aims to discern patterns in thecareer development of women managers , and to examine if these patterns conform to career models such asthose proposed by White, Cox, and Cooper (1992) and White (1995, 2000). The case data comprise of thecareer journeys of 20 women managers from a broad cross-section of occupational sectors in New Zealand.The data reveal that although the majority of women managers display high career centrality, they do notwork continuously as they have several years of interruptions for bearing and rearing children, and workpart-time and retrain themselves through further education before returning to the workplace. Interestingly,they do not seem to plan their careers
A Book Review
Get PDFMay Sarton\u27s final journal, At Eighty-Two, calls to mind Eleanor Roosevelt\u27s My Day, though their dayswere quite different.In essence, Sarton\u27s journal is about approaching death. Specifically, it is focused on the impending finaldays of this prolific poet, novelist and journalist. Even though one brings to the reading experienceenormous empathy and sympathy, the overall result is exceedingly depressing. Sarton writes in suchdetail about the multiple facets of her illness and especially about her overpowering depression that thedark aura of the book is inescapable. Not even her rich vocabulary and fresh turn of phrase relieved theoverall gloom. However, one would have to be totally without feeling to criticize the books content in acensorial way because of this sober tone
WOMEN AS LEADERS: PIECING TOGETHER THEIR REFLECTIONS ON LIFE AND THE PRINCIPALSHIP
Get PDFJust as the women who, for generations, worked alone and together to piece together the scraps and remains of former clothing to provide warm coverings for their family members, were not acknowledged as legitimate artists until the women\u27s movement, women leaders have not, until more recently, been acknowledged as legitimate leaders in organizations. Some writers have noted that there is a new paradigm of leadership developing in contemporary organizations, due partly to the strengths that women are realizing they bring to the workplace. The paradigm has been there for some time, but there is now enough of a critical mass of women in formal organizations and unique entrepreneurial efforts that the effects of that paradigm are being felt (Bancroft, 1995; Lee, 1994). Called "the subtle revolution," the increase in numbers of executive and management women has changed, and will continue to change, the attitudes and actions of organizations (Helgesen, 1990; Leavitt, 1988; Towery, 1998). This need reinforces Harding\u27s (1987) position that, until the less powerful raise their voices to articulate their experiences, all leaders and their organizations will not benefit or gain perspective from those experiences. Undoubtedly, attention must be paid to the need for leadership theory that acknowledges and incorporates women\u27s experiences and perspectives (Helgesen, 1990; Regan & Brooks, 1995; Shakeshaft, 1989; Waggoner, 1998)
Attitudes Toward Women Leaders Analyzed by Gender and Occupations (1984-1998)
Get PDFIn 1984, responding to the concerns of female graduate students, I founded Oakland University\u27s Women in Leadership Forum. The Forum was designed to provide skill sessions to assist women in their search for leadership positions in education and social service agencies. In addition to the skill sessions, panels of successful women in leadership positions provided valuable insights as well as strategies for success. The design also included a research component to study the prevailing attitudes of women and men toward women leaders with a comparison of leadership styles of women and men. Attitudes are formed at an early age and are reinforced by prevailing traditions and society\u27s socialization processes. It was deemed important to assess attitudes for attitudes in turn shape our reactions and assessments of ourselves and other
The Impact of Feminist Pastoral Counseling on the Self -Esteem of Female Christians
Get PDFFeminist therapy has risen correspondingly to feminism since 1960 (Israeli & Santor, 2000). Dutton-Douglas and Walker (1988) stated that over a decade feminist theory has greatly impacted the major therapy systems. Feminist therapy also has developed considerably and brought its unique contribution to the area of psychotherapy. This therapy addresses four important issues, which are: (a) the special problems that women bring into the therapeutic setting, such as motherhood, employment discrimination, marriages, rape, wife abuse, sexual harassment, etc.; (b) sex-role socialization in the development of women, for example, women are expected to maintain the body image of a certain thin figure and try their best to stay young because this society adores youth, especially for women, and other social sex-roles which keep women subordinate to the other gender and, therefore, causes women\u27 s unhealthy problems.; (c) the inadequacies of contemporary theory, research, and practice in addressing the lives of women; and (d) the development of alternative approaches to conceptualization and intervention with women (Worell & Remer,1992)
Linking Literacy and Community Development: A Case Study of Women in New Orleans
Get PDFThis paper examines the impact of a family literacy program in New Orleans , developed in response to low literacy levels, high drop-out rates, and a corresponding lack of resident participation in community development efforts in the area. The program, Toyota Families for Learning (TFFL), worked to transcend disciplinary barriers by linking adult literacy education and community development through a community-based approach to adult literacy. TFFL continuously evolved to serve as a catalyst for transformation in the lives of the women it served, their families, and their communities. The experiences of the women in this study were explored in relation to the following indicators of community building: (1) developing the ability to express personal experiences and observed phenomena, (2) constructing one\u27s own knowledge, (3) setting and following through on goals, (4) building a positive community environment, and (5) developing a vision of the community. Qualitative data in the form of literacy narratives informed this inquiry. The narratives were triangulated with field notes and focus group data collected over a six-year period commencing in 1992. The findings of this research indicate that literacy programs can be structured to successfully build the capacity of participants to engage in community development processes
Educational Leadership: Where are the Women?
Get PDFThroughout time, stereotypes regarding women and men have permeated society, creating many obstacles for women, especially in the professional world. Where words like nurturing, compassionate, emotional, expressive, communal, passive, uncertain, subjective and supportive have historically been used to describe women; words like intelligent, powerful, competent, objective, independent, methodical and driven have typically been reserved to describe men (Porat, 1991). These adjectives have long supported the social perception that men are superior and women are inferior. Obviously times are changing. Women are emerging as powerful leaders in business and government and are disproving many long-standing skewed perceptions of females. Despite these advances, however, certain labels for women continue to impede their efforts to be strong leaders in other areas