Notes from the General Manager, By Diane Jacoutot
I was having a videoconference with the Deputy Director of THIS project yesterday and he explained that everyone was off work because it was International Women’s Day. In Kazakhstan, International Women’s Day, he said, is bigger than Mother’s Day in his home country of Ireland, which is big indeed. At NIS headquarters they celebrated a day early by having all the men pitch in money and they bought and presented to each women at Nazarbayev’s head office a dozen red roses and a Kazakh vase. Then they had a big banquet for everyone and they all went home early. And they had the next day off because International Women’s Day is a public holiday in Kazakhstan! He said walking around Astana that evening at dinner time, you could see women and girls everywhere carrying flowers, and being treated specially.
Of course many of the Teachanywhere team, men and women alike though especially women, became instantly enamoured of the idea. Mother’s day is often celebrated in our cultures but what if you are not a mother? Then it started the debate, “Is it right that women are celebrated? What about men? “ , to which Charlotte piped in, “But every other day is Men’s Day!”
Which is not technically true in the international school sector.
One of the many interesting aspects of international life is that you must conform to the local laws and cultures of the country in which you are working, even if you don’t necessarily agree with them. Just like the Masai Warriors who came to run the London Marathon didn’t agree that they should not be allowed to kill and eat any livestock they happened across during their training, when you enter into someone else’s country you play by their rules....so they didn’t, much to the relief of local farmers. Therefore, I need to point out that in many countries around the world, the gender of some jobs are regulated by law. One person’s discrimination is another person’s legislation.
In many countries of the Middle East for example, men are not legally allowed to teach young children, which is why you see some of our adverts say Female Early Years teacher and some schools are entirely girls schools into which men are not allowed. Even the maintenance workers are female. But the opposite is not always true – women are often allowed into boys schools. This has strong cultural roots in Middle East ways of life. At many weddings, for example, men and women do not attend the same reception – they are segregated by gender so there is a women’s reception and a men’s reception. Gender segregation is tightly woven into the fabric of their lives and it’s reflected in educational practices.
Because of this we find ourselves in awkward discussions with perfectly qualified male teachers saying, “Look I know this is discrimination in your country to tell you I won’t put you forward for this job, but if I placed you in this job, you could get deported.” And on the flip side, I can’t tell you the number of times schools have come to me saying “we really want a man for this job”, and often it’s a Principal role in a developing country. To which I reply, “Look I hear what you are saying about the qualities you want, but if I find a really good woman for this I will also put them forward and explain why” And sometimes it has worked. Why did I push the limits in the second case but not the first? Because I was not breaking any laws, just stereotypes.
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