Males and early childhood care and education: student, staff and parent survey evidence

Abstract

The early childhood care and education workforce is overwhelmingly female dominated. Males who choose a career in education have a greater attraction to working with older (secondary and primary) over younger (early childhood education) children. We examine reasons for this phenomenon by analysing survey responses of recent education degree graduates in Australia. We also report analysis of purpose designed surveys of first-year university students, staff employed in early childhood services, and parents of children attending children's services centres in NSW. Our preliminary results failed to detect stereotypical gender attitudes as barriers to increased male participation in the workforce. While this is an encouraging result in terms of recruitment, the characteristics of the industry mean that the problem could shift to one of retention of male staff, given the resilience of the 'male breadwinnner' concept in society.