A Gender Puzzle: An Inverse Relationship Between Gender Streaming in Secondary Education and Societal Degree of Gender Equality

• In Event: Worldwide Perspectives on Gender and Education Research

Abstract

We use the unique setting of the Israeli education system to show how gender streaming that channels women away from mathematically intensive fields is conditioned by cultural factors. Israeli society comprises two cultural groups distinguished by language—Hebrew and Arabic—and attending mostly separate schools. We find that female Arab students, though belonging to a social group characterized by low female participation in the labor market, are more likely than male Arab students to choose traditionally male-dominated subjects in high school—reversing patterns observed in Israel's Jewish population and in Western society, in general. This finding holds also when controlling for prior achievement, family background and school characteristics, indicating the complex relationship between culture, norms and gender streaming in education.

Authors

• Naomi H. Friedman-Sokuler, Ben Gurion University of the Negev

• Moshe Justman, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev