A recent study done by three professors at Eastern Washington University (EWU) suggests that female professors face a more demanding workload than male professors.
The study reveals that female professors are subject to more special requests from students, such as allowing the submission of late assignments, improving grades or academic standing, and demands for extensions.
The researchers conducted two studies in which the first one included surveying professors across the U.S., while the second study used fictitious female or male professors to test whether gender played a role in students making special favour requests.
The study’s three lead authors, professors Amani El-Alayli, Ashley A. Hansen Brown, and Michelle Ceynar are all faculty members at EWU and claim that they have experienced first-hand the inequalities that the classroom can create.
El-Alayli became interested in this topic when she recognized the bizarre treatment she was getting in the classroom, and began to suspect it may have something to do with the fact that she was a woman.
However, the research taught her that it’s a much more complex issue.
“Rather than stemming from negative attitudes about women, I now believe that much of this gender bias may occur because students have higher expectations of their female professors,” she said.
The results showed that students had a harder time taking no for an answer from female professors, and that these professors were most often left spending more time in the office, keeping up with student requests.
Amrita Hari, a women’s and gender studies professor at Carleton University, said she also believes it is a much more complicated problem.
“Is [gender] a factor?” she said. “Yes. But I will also add that it is not the only factor.” She said she believes that age, race, class, and being a woman of colour can also contribute to the issue.
Additional conclusions drawn from the EWU study show that professors vulnerable to unfair treatment endure working conditions that are more complicated, mentally draining, and time consuming than their male counterparts.
“All of this could interfere with female professors’ likelihood of promotion,” El-Alayli added.
The research shows that although members of the academic community may be aware of the inequalities facing women in the workplace and classroom, this does not necessarily mean that discrimination doesn’t occur.
“I don’t think students are ill intentioned. I think they are ill-informed,” Hari said, “We all have internalized and externalized forms of discrimination. Bias can be very unconscious.”
As a result, El-Alayli said she believes that it is important to consider personal prejudices when approaching professors, and recognizing them could mean a major step forward for equality in the classroom.
“We all want to view ourselves as unbiased, but [addressing our biases] must be done if we are to treat people fairly,” she said.
Photo by Aaron Hemens
