More male teachers - doesn't that mean fewer females?

[mids2019]

https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/apr/03/bridget-phillipson-education-secretary-more-male-teachers-adolescence

I don't think this was a considered statement as in world where women have had to fight hard for representation in professions it is is grange for a cabinet Secretary to advocate for more men in a professiion. We certainly wouldn't see the health Secretary advocate for male doctors in a profession historically dominated by men at least until the last few decades.

I don't think teachers are there primarily to be role models but educators. The sex of the teacher should make no difference only their overall ability to the job. To somehow suggest a male has more authority or respect from male pupils surely is just veiled sexism?

I don't personally agree......

I don’t see what difference it would make.

If it makes no difference supposedly then why does it have to be a female? That's a bit hypocritical I'm a female and most of my favourite teachers were male

Male teachers make a big difference to boys at primary level, especially these days when a lot of children don’t have a positive male role model in their lives. This is about children, not women

Lovely idea, as long as they are the best person for the job and not just being hired because they are male. About 4 years ago our local school hired a man and he was absolutely rubbish, the kids loved him because he was 'fun', but he didn't teach half what he was supposed to and the children didn't learn anything. He didn't last long. As a parent, I want whoever is going to help my child learn.

My first thought was that if the government wants more male teachers then they’re going to have to increase the salary significantly! There’s already a recruitment crisis, just calling for more men to enter teaching is not going to help.

I just think best person for the job. Maybe if more men apply ratios may change but positive discrimination is not the answer.

surely though role models can be present in terms of sporting coaches and other external figures rather than adding 'role model' to a teachers job description. Also what just teachers? Is it great we have Donald Trump as president of the US instead of Kamala as he acts a great make role model? Maybe the Tories should choose a man next time as their leader to show men can succeed? Sorry to my mind The idea of more men in the teaching profession needs a little more thought and seems a knee jerk reaction to combating the complex problem of masulinity.

Getting men into primary school teaching positions would need an increase in salary. It's sad to say but anecdotally a lot of our local female primary school teachers have relatively wealthy other halves and do job partially because the holidays fit round school holidays for their children.

There needs to be salary increases in teaching across the board.

More teachers of any sex are welcome.

seems a bit hypocritical to complain about this because we would not say "well we should not have more female ( insert underrepresented profession) because it means less men in them...."

I have worked with many male teachers who fit this stereotype unfortunately!

The way teaching is right now, we just need more teachers, male or female, it really doesn’t matter.

We have more female doctors than men in Bombay specialities but we wouldn't necessarily say we should bias recruitment to get more men in because men feel more at ease with a female or men act as role models for you patienrs. It seems the teaching profession are asked to take on the role model task?

The recruitment crisis isn’t due to salary, which is decent - £30k-50k and more if a Head Teacher or deputy. Teachers are leaving due to many other reasons.

I'm a teacher. The kids do need more male teachers. Teaching is fundamentally about the kids, not the adults.

And we need to believe male teachers when they say that they understand boys better than we do.

How does having more make teachers help solve retnetion? I just still think it is a political throw away comment to show the government is aware of toxic masculinity but also maybe a all for those who think some proffessions are overly feminised.

Finding see how a male teacher acts any more of a role model as a female teacher and many of those who are most prone to toxic masculinity will not be aspiring to be a teacher anyway.

Male or female how much of teachers time is taken up with dealing with problem students and bad behaviour as parents dont believe their saints do anything wrong, friend squabbles, parents who really need to talk to the teacher because the child next to them dropped their pencil and they are complaining another child had the picture on the wall for 2 weeks where their child had it only up for 13 days, all the government paperwork, party invitations, any every other non teaching thing parents demand

How much teaching are they actually able to do?

Deffoneedanamechange

If you replace teacher with doctor in the statement with the argument men understand make patients better does not that sound like sexism? In what way do men understand boys better? Does teaching trigonometry matter depending on the sex of the teacher? It seems that your argument suggests teachers getting involved in significant pastoral care with make a teachers being more relatable in that sense; I would agree with this to an extent but teaching is not primarily about the out of lesson coversations.

Most kids see a doctor once every 3 years. They see their teacher pretty much every day. You're making a ridiculous comparison.

And FWIW I do think that all patients should have a choice of male or female doctor/nurse where appropriate. Again, the driving purpose of medicine is to provide medical care for patients, not to provide jobs.

Then I still dont get why there has to be more female teachers

I think more male teachers would be amazing. Kids do need both. And yes it does mean less female teachers, but that’s what the call for more women in finance and banking and government and industry means for men. My company report and talk about how they are supporting and building the number of women at work all the time.

Hang on, why is positive discrimination okay when we are trying to boost numbers of ethnic minorities in key positions, boost women in c-suite roles, make disabled people more visible, but now when we find an area where more men are needed suddenly it's "Nope, not gonna provide any help to that group". I worry about the lack of role models for boys. We know what happens when boys aren't made to feel included (Andrew Tate anyone?).

https://ghaffar.substack.com/p/the-boys-are-not-alright?utm_source=substack&publication_id=1025398&post_id=160320991&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&utm_campaign=email-share&action=share&triggerShare=true&isFreemail=true&r=1nuxff&triedRedirect=true

Actually I think boys need positive male role models more than ever.

I am a maths teacher as it happens. The thing is, we're not imparting logical truths to a room of robots. We're crafting engaging lessons for human beings, and we're dealing with human behaviour. And yes, at least half my job is pastoral.

Of course I like to think I'm a very effective teacher for both boys and girls (honestly, I am a pretty good teacher). But I rely heavily on guidance and advice from male colleagues. We would not be so effective as department if we didn't have any men.

my DS were lucky enough to have a few primary school male teachers, and I think they benefited from seeing that both men and women teach kids of this age. Traditionally primary tends to have mostly women teachers in my experience. DS2 had a reception male teacher and he was caring and compassionate and I like the fact that DS2 saw men acting in this way.
Men and women need to take roles in early years education because if we don't have that then caring for kids is seen as women's work and we never challenge stereotypes. it's not about saying men have more authority, it's showing that both sexes have a role to play in education and it's important for boys to see role models in this area.

Deffoneedanamechange

I can see some argument for more men in a pastoral setting but that to my mind is slightly separate form the main responsibility of the profession? Perhaps more make teaching assistants would be a partial solution? I also feel women do act as good role models in teaching as from a very early age pupils do see boys having to respect women and see women as authoritative figures deserving respect which to my mind counters toxic masculinity.

Men have many role models in further society e.g. footballers etc. so is there a need to extend the role model role into the class.

They're already treated as though they're made of gold.