Males and Tertiary Education in Jamaica

Herbert Gayle, Peisha Bryan

• Éditeur: The University of the West Indies Press
• Année: 2019
• ISBN:
  9789766407315

Males and Tertiary Education in Jamaica is the result of five years' qualitative research examining the relationship between men and tertiary education. Herbert Gayle and Peisha Bryan focus on the lived experiences and perceptions of three sets of young men: those who did not qualify to enter university; those who qualified but bypassed tertiary education; and those who qualified but for varying reasons have delayed entry into university. Using rigorous, in-depth interviews to capture the lived experiences of 186 males between the ages of eighteen and thirty-nine years, compared to those of 74 females of the same comparative age group, the authors examine the realities of males regarding their wish or ability to attend university in Jamaica. They found that men's comparative absence from universities in Jamaica is cultural. Spurred by the world phenomenon of women's liberation, Jamaican families shifted their support towards educating women to the effect that female enrolment in tertiary institutions increased from 64 per cent of men in 1971 to 228 per cent of men in 2011. Participation in tertiary education in Jamaica is unquestionably gendered and this work is the first and book-length scholarly response to the question of why men are not attracted to tertiary education in Jamaica.

CHAPTER 1

BACKGROUND TO THE STUDY

THE STUDY IS FOCUSED ON GENDER-BASED TERTIARY educational participation and therefore uses, among others, a socio-demographic developmental approach in order to focus on socialization during childhood and adulthood. The variables covered in the study are cultural, structural and psycho-social, underpinned by a systemic interlinkage that allowed for an assessment of the life cycle and the interdependencies between different groupings and societal elements.

The literature demonstrates that determining the factors that affect social participation requires a holistic approach that incorporates a multi-dimensional quasi-case study or whole-life view of the developmental and interaction processes between the individual and society. Hence, while the primary focus of our discussion is examining and describing frames and thoughts on the issue of male social participation in tertiary education, this cannot be understood outside of the general social context of education and social arrangements and functions.

Social scientists generally agree that for an activity to be social it has to involve interaction. Hence, male social participation in tertiary education can be described as an activity that both involves interaction and is the result of interaction. Male social participation is the result of socialization through interaction with the primary group of the family, and the secondary groups of the school, peer, religious institution and workplace, among others. Important to understanding this dynamic is the influence of societal factors such as social class, area of residence and gender, which are at the base of the current study. The gender-based approach to the structure of, participation in and delivery of tertiary education is a representation of local and regional responses to globalization; international, regional and local social organization; and power relations among and within states.

Over the past four decades, there has been development in the capacity of educational systems globally, as well as increased participation in all levels of the education system. Estimates of school-life expectancy show that the global figure increased from 7.9 years in 1970 to 11.0 years in 2008 (UIS 2010, 14). Table 1.1 shows changes in the enrolment levels of students in primary, secondary and tertiary education between 1970 and 2008.

It is important to note that tertiary education showed the highest percentage increase of the three levels, a sign that greater emphasis has been placed on tertiary education as critical to development. Interestingly, a higher percentage of females than males enrolled in tertiary education, and this was higher than the level of population growth for both sexes in the respective age groups. This is noted to have been the reality for the region since the mid-1990s (UIS 2010, 20).

The Caribbean has been an extraordinary example of the impact of investments in female tertiary education: it is the only region with four countries in the global top ten where women outnumber men in tertiary enrolment. The Bahamas is ranked third, Guyana fourth, Barbados fifth, and Jamaica sixth. In 1970 there were 73 women to every 100 men enrolled in tertiary education on average in the world. In 2011 this changed to 108 women to 100 men. In the Bahamas there are 271 women enrolled in tertiary education to every 100 men; in Guyana there are 252; in Barbados there are 238 women, and in Jamaica there are 228 (Hausmann, Tyson and Zahidi 2012). The situation for Jamaica is interesting as it moved from a lower figure for female tertiary enrolment than the world’s average, and especially that of the rest of the Caribbean, which was higher than the world’s average in 1970. Chart 1.1 shows the dramatic difference between Jamaica and the world.

Table 1.1. World Increase in Educational Enrolment 1970 to 2008

Educational Level	Year Number of Students Enrolled (Million)		Actual Increase	Percentage Increase over Base Period 1970–2008
	1970	2008
Primary	415	696	281	68%
Secondary	195	526	331	170%
Tertiary	32	159	127	400%

Source: UIS 2010.

The evidence shows that higher levels of female participation, especially as it relates to gender parity with males, is more likely to be observed in two types of countries: those with very high incomes and less developed ones with “relatively small tertiary systems” such as Jamaica (UIS 2010, 70). It is important to note that globally there is gender parity for males and females graduating with a first degree (51 per cent males to 49 per cent females); the balance then tips in favour of females at the master’s degree level (56 per cent females to 44 per cent males), and is reversed in favour of males at the doctoral level (56 per cent males to 44 per cent females) (UIS 2010, 77). The data on tertiary enrolment for the Caribbean distinguish the region from the world – females dominate all three levels. To illustrate, for the years 2010 to 2016 at the Mona Campus of the University of the West Indies (UWI, the region’s premier university), females comprise 69 per cent of undergraduates, 71 per cent of master’s students and 64 per cent of doctoral students.

Chart 1.1. Change in Female Tertiary Education Enrolment – Jamaica Compared to the World

According to data from the UNESCO Institute for Statistics (UIS 2010) and the World Economic Forum 2012, the disproportionately higher level of female participation in tertiary education is not reflected in the labour market, where males dominate in senior positions and females are noted to require “more years” of schooling to gain equal salary to that of males. Jamaica is a unique case and thus worthy of study. Table 1.2 summarizes the Gender Gap Report of 2012. The table is divided into three sections. The top section is related to social well-being, the middle section to economic and political power and the bottom section is the human development index adjusted by gender. The top section shows that Jamaican women have achieved immense educational opportunities and that this has benefited them in two ways: social power and health. Jamaican women have achieved a high level of literacy and, behind Lesotho, they have the highest advantage over men in this area. High levels of literacy lead to Jamaican women having the sixth greatest advantage over men in tertiary enrolment. Jamaica is therefore among the thirty-two countries in which women have comparatively better health and survival. Jamaica is also among countries where women enjoy a “healthy life expectancy” substantially higher than men, despite the health-related risks associated with reproduction.

Table 1.2. Summary of Gender Gap Report 2012

Categories	Jamaica	Critical Details	Other Caribbean Countries Worth Noting
Health and survival	1st	Score: 0.9796 (98% compared to males)	Bahamas, Barbados, Belize: also ranked number 1 in the world
Literacy rate	2nd	Score: 1.12 (112 to 100 males, or 91% to 82% literate males)	Bahamas 5th (also in top 10)
Tertiary education	6th	228 females enrolled to 100 males	Bahamas 3rd, Guyana 4th, Barbados 5th also in top 10
Healthy life expectancy	43rd	Females 66 years in good health, males 62 years	Belize 9th, Bahamas 22nd, Barbados 48th, Guyana 56th
Legislators, senior officials and managers	1st	59% females, 41% males	Bahamas 7th, Trinidad and Tobago 8th, Barbados 9th also in top 10
Economic participation and opportunity	38th	Score: 0.7214 (72 to 100 males)	Bahamas 2nd, Barbados 11th, Trinidad and Tobago 47th, Belize 77th, Guyana 94th also in top 100
Female ministers	49th	Females 20% of Cabinet – 4 of 20	Guyana 25th, Cuba 41st, Trinidad and Tobago 52nd, Barbados 83rd also in top 100
Labour-force participation	63rd	Score: 79 (compared to 100 males)	Bahamas 22nd, Barbados 23rd, Trinidad and Tobago 77th, Cuba 95th also in top 100
Comparative wages	83rd	Score: 0.63 (63 cents to every dollar earned by males)	Barbados 72nd, Trinidad and Tobago 72nd also in top 100
Women in Parliament	92nd	Score: 13% female – 8 of 63	Cuba 1st, Guyana 25th, Trinidad and Tobago 29th, Bahamas 90th also in top 100
Overall ranking	51st	Jamaica overall HDI ranking: 85th	Cuba 19th, Barbados 27th, Bahamas 37th, Guyana 42nd, Trinidad and Tobago 43rd

Source: Hausmann, Tyson and Zahidi 2012.

In Jamaica, women’s progress in the last four decades has two shortcomings: economic and political. Jamaican women hold the top positions in the country in terms of being managers and senior officials, but those positions do not provide women with political or economic parity with men. Women dominate legislation located below the Jamaican parliament and cabinet and are very likely to manage businesses owned by men. Jamaica is ranked thirty-eighth in women’s participation in the economy and projected opportunities with seventy-two females to every hundred males. There are also seventy-nine women in the labour force to every hundred men. The critical problem is the quality of the participation. Jamaican women only earn sixty-three cents to men’s dollar. Women’s massive social achievement but relatively weak performance in economics and politics suggests that education has limits. These data say that education does not guarantee the means to establish and maintain power or meet the dicta of masculinity; hence women’s limited progress could be used as part of the rationale by some men (and to a lesser extent some women) to bypass education, or seek specific aspects of education or programmes that have a higher rate of achieving economic and political power.

According to Chevannes (1999), the problem of low male participation in tertiary education is related to definitions of masculinity and male readiness for survival. In the Caribbean masculinity is largely defined by physical attributes and the ability to provide and protect, rather than by intellectual and emotional capacity. As a result, the school environment is sometimes viewed as a feminine space that holds boys back from becoming men. The literature shows that socialization in the Caribbean is significant to understanding the decisions males make about their education.

Various studies have posited that even if male attitudes were positive towards tertiary education, many simply lack the financial support to attend tertiary institutions, as many families think that once secondary schooling is complete it is time to harvest their breadwinners (Gayle 2002). Most females have no such time limit. In fact, education is widely seen as females’ critical means of escaping dependence and abuse. Scholars, including Anderson (2001) and Chevannes (2001), have shown that completing school could be seen as counterintuitive to some males.

According to Anderson (2001), the unemployment level in 1998 of young males with no secondary education was 12.9 per cent, while it was 26.2 per cent for those with four or more years of secondary education. On the other hand, for the corresponding period, young females with no secondary education had an unemployment rate of 51.9 per cent, while those who had achieved four or more years of secondary-level education had an unemployment rate of 40.6 per cent (Anderson 2001, 46). In accordance with the data presented, Anderson concludes that pursuit of secondary education demonstrated a greater rate of increase in opportunities for employment in the case of females than males. Anderson explains that the transformation of the economy went in the direction of a widening of the service sector, which has a bias in favour of females. Concurrently, there was a contracting of sectors such as agriculture, which has traditionally had a predominantly male labour force.

Anderson (2001) shows that the occupational structure and size of the labour market in relation to the labour force created a situation where females face greater levels of competition in gaining employment with placement based on educational achievement. Within such a context, it is quite fair to infer that women require higher levels of educational attainment as part of their survival tool kit than men. As such, women are more likely to calculate higher levels of marginal utility and return on investment from educational achievement. Concurrently, the structure of the labour market predisposes men to calculate lower levels of return on educational investment. Based on the primacy of economic provision as part of the male role, in a context lacking congruence between education and employment, rationality would dictate that men seek income-earning activities outside of the formal labour market and its normative constructs. Males face a double-edged sword in the labour force: education does not reward them and yet non-education sectors are shrinking. Hence, Anderson (2001) speaks of an increase in male involvement in informal and underground economic activities.

It is understood that females are more likely to maximize subsidized education in Jamaica since, when resources are scarce, working-class families tend to send girls to school at the expense of boys due to the practice of protecting the female in harsh environments (Chevannes 2001) and because of higher returns from girls on parent investment in education (Figueroa and Hondu 1996). Low education participation of either males or females retards the development of a country, given the fact that quality training drives econom...