New school bid for ‘male-only’ offers

The
Catholic Weekly
Online

Sydney
1 February 2004

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New school bid for ‘male-only’ offers

By Damir Govorcin

The Sydney Catholic Education Office is preparing to go into battle again for the right to offer male-only teacher scholarships.

The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission turned down a request last year for an exemption under the Sex Discrimination Act.

The Catholic Education Office appeal against the rejection will be heard on April 14.

The office had sought a five-year exemption from sex discrimination laws to offer male-only scholarships to encourage more men to take up a teaching career.

Last year, only 10 of the 57 scholarships offered by the Sydney Catholic Education Office went to men.

Br Kelvin Canavan, executive director of schools in the archdiocese, says that 80 per cent of such scholarships in the past five years have been taken up by women.

The Education Office applied for the exemption to allow it to offer some primary teacher training scholarships that give preferential treatment to male students.

“It is an attempt to address the drastic shortage of male teachers in primary schools, so that students can have more male role models,” says Br Kelvin.

He agrees with the commission that the reasons for the lower number of males choosing to teach in primary schools are complex.

But the problem of attracting male teachers into primary schools remains.

“The number of male teachers continues to decline and we are exploring every avenue possible to reverse the trend,” he said.

Redressing the imbalance could only have beneficial effects for students in the long term, he said.

“In the final analysis, this needs to be a community decision,” he added. “If parents want more males in primary schools, they need to make known their views.”