The reality of ITT programmes in relation to gender equality

There is a clear relationship between governments’ policies and ITT programmes. In England, Davies, Mountford and Gannon (2009: 384) state that in many countries, ITT programmes are one of the ways for the governments to put reform into effect. Equally, in a study in Mozambique, researchers have found that governments have the main responsibility in developing gender equal pedagogy for trainee teachers (Aikman, Unterhalter and Challender, 2005: 53). In England, an inspection of ITT shows that it is necessary to spend more time on social justice (Skelton, 2007: 679). Further, in the 1990s, Coffey and Acker (1991: 27) pointed out the fact that when there was a demand from local authorities, the government gave more funding and set national in-service priorities on gender equality that led to an increased incentive for universities to invest in courses on gender issues although the increase was little. However, five years later, higher education institutions were reported to lag behind schools in commitment to gender equality (Murphy, 1996: 20). Indeed, by 2005, some optional modules about gender were withdrawn due to the pressure of time and the demands of some elements, which had more emphasis in the government policy such as behaviour management (Skelton, 2007: 670). Two sides of TTA in dealing with gender issues in the curriculum for ITT are that on one hand, TTA lets ITT institutions devise their curriculum for ITT, on the other hand, it is an ‘authoritarian patriarch’ ‘who dispenses punishment and rewards through a system of regular and scrutinising inspection procedures’ (Mahony and Hextall, 2000 cited in Skelton, 2007: 680). To pass the inspection, institutions have to give more focus on what the government regards as important (Skelton, 2007). Thus, the government has power to make ITT programmes put gender issues at the centre of their curriculum.

Younger and Warrington (2008: 431) recognise that after 20 years of restructuring ITT in England, the government is giving ‘due recognition’ to the quality of newly qualified teachers. However, the curriculum for ITT about gender equality is still in debate with lots of critiques about what has been done on gender issues in ITT or about the lack of theories as well as issues relating to lecturers and students in inducting gender into the curriculum. They affirm that re-activating the debates on gender equality in ITT is necessary (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 429) because the reports of the OFSTED, which carries out inspections and regulates procedures throughout England and reports to the Parliament (OFSTED, 2013), and the TDA, ‘the national agency and recognised sector body

responsible for the training and development of the school workforce’ (TDA, 2012), reveal only silence on gender (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 432). They argue that among 24 questions in TDA survey, there is no question relating to gender issues in schools. In the handbook Qualifying to Teach which interprets the criteria for ITT in the year 2007, there is ‘no explicit reference whatsoever to gender issues, not even in the context of achievement and diversity or in the terms of the promotion of equality and inclusion in teaching’ (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 432). Or by examining the statutory duty of public services to deal with gender issues released by government’s gender duty code of practice in the year 2007 and even the guidance for schools to tackle gender stereotypes and other issues relating to gender, it can be said that gender equality in ITT curriculum in England is invisible (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 433). On the website of TDA-it has been closed but main work and publications have been transferred to the Teaching Agency, there is the commitment to improve the quality of ITT in England, but among 33 listed, no point focuses on gender issues (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 439).

Together with the analysis of Skelton about the subsumption of gender issues into the list of ‘diversities’ (ethnic minorities, disabilities, sexualities, gender identities) (Skelton, 2007: 682) as mentioned above, it can be concluded that gender equality has been put into practice of the curriculum for ITT in England but due to the political and local demands, it has not worked effectively and as Skelton claims, the significance of gender’s knowledge to both teachers’ and students’ opportunities and educational experience have been ‘marginalized and downplayed’ (Skelton, 2007: 687). Gender equity is subsumed in the larger term as ‘diversities’ (Skelton, 2007) and it exists in the curriculum for ITT but the absence of gender issues in national reports (Younger and Warrington, 2008) reveals that it does not play a major role in the qualification of trainee teachers in England nor in the aim of the process of promoting equality and inclusivity in teaching.

In Vietnam, the curriculum for ITT is set out by the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET, 2013b) and it is they who decide the core curriculum with compulsory subjects and soft curriculum with main subjects, which vary due to different departments of ITT (MOET, 2013b). The researcher has examined both the core and peripheral curriculum of all ITT subjects on the website of MOET but there are no words relating to gender or girls or boys. From her own experience as a trainee teacher and then a high school teacher in a university of pedagogy, she perceives that there is very little content relating to psychology

as a subject in the curriculum of ITT that mentions the psychology of girls and boys and there is no explicit content relating to gender equality. Indeed, she cannot find any literature about the curriculum for ITT relating to gender issues.

To sum up, in England, developing gender issues more fully in teacher education is considered crucial and there is a need to connect or reconnect between research and practice of gender issues in ITT (Younger and Warrington, 2008: 441). In Vietnam, gender issues have not been the focus in the curriculum for ITT. The next section will outline the lack of theories on gender issues for ITT as well as the difficulties that lecturers and trainee teachers encounter when teaching and learning gender equality in ITT programmes in England and some developed countries.