Gender Inequity
Comments (0) Excerpted from Decision Skills for Colleges. Copyright 2008, Institute for Global Ethics
Matt is a biology major taking an advanced course in his major. He is doing well in the class and needs to earn a respectable grade to maintain his GPA and keep his scholarship. Although he personally doesn’t have any problems with the professor, Dr. Smith, Matt has overheard the female students in the class complain about Dr. Smith’s sexist attitudes. Matt also has heard Dr. Smith insinuate that he believes women don’t belong in science, but Matt dismissed this as basically harmless and somewhat typical of a man Smith’s age.
A classmate of Matt’s, Kim, tells Matt that she believes Dr. Smith is grading down her work because of her gender. She turns in all of her assignments on time and attends all classes and labs, but still is only earning a “C.”
Kim has interviewed a number of Dr. Smith’s female students and believes she has the evidence she needs to confront him. Kim hopes that if a group of Dr. Smith’s students join together, they can do this successfully. Matt believes that Dr. Smith gives women lower grades than men, but isn’t sure if he should get involved in case it would affect his grade. Matt can’t afford to jeopardize his GPA if he’s going to keep his scholarships.
Themocracy