we need to talk

xkcd.com #385

Today in calculus class we were playing a game to determine the "Supreme Awesome Student of 4th Period."  Several students were absent and someone noticed that there was only one female student in class.  In fact, only 20% of that particular section are female.  In my other calculus section, 45% of the class is female. 

One student commented as a "joke" that women aren't good at math anyway.  Of course I set him straight, but it got me thinking about the most visible academic role models in my students' lives, their teachers.  I did a quick survey of my school's faculty and got the following results.  You can see a listing of all of our faculty at our website. 

Department	% Female	% Male
Math	83%	17%
Science	58%	42%
Social Science	40%	60%
English	55%	45%
World Languages	81%	19%
Fine Arts	60%	40%
Computer Science	50%	50%
Physical Education	50%	50%
Entire School	61%	39%

It turns out roughly 60% of my school's faculty are female.  Women constitute at least half of every department except social science.  These are quick numbers.  I made no effort to weigh the difference between a part-time and full time member of a department.  Some members of our faculty teach in two departments, and I have no idea whether these numbers are typical of private 6-12 schools like mine or private or public schools in general. 

Today's class got me thinking about the fact that a student in our school would make such a statement despite the fact that 83% of the math department faculty are women, and he himself has never had a male math teacher at our school.  (I checked)  I also wonder about the conclusions our students draw about academic work and the career paths they might pursue based on the role models that surround them. 

I think there's a lot to think and talk about in this event.  I welcome your thoughts. 

An interesting SciLog blog post:  Math is a Girl Thing

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