paying-attention

Once again, there is data available that shows that it is indeed harmful to have different expectations of individuals based on grouping. A recent study looked at stress among highly educated professionals. Here's an excerpt:

"...data show women [on college faculties] having greater stress than men on a range of work related issues:

Percentage Reporting Some or Extensive Stress Related to Certain Job Duties

Duty/Issue Creating Stress:
Teaching load: Men 47.5 Women 57.9
Students: Men 49.7 Women 65.8
Research and publishing: Men 67.1 Women 85.7
Review and promotion: Men 44.8 Women 65.3
Committee work: Men 61.6 Women 74.7

Such data could, of course, be read as a comment on how women experience stress, not whether they are justified in feeling more of it. But the authors of the study then went to examine university records on teaching loads, and they found that women there, on average, are doing more teaching than are men....

....Summing up the problems female faculty members face with students, the authors wrote that "women felt students expected them to balance authority and nurturance in the classroom in ways that their male colleagues were not. Having to consider this balance while trying to deliver a course that is meaningful certainly contributes to stress related to teaching and students."...."

— Scott Jaschik, Inside Higher Ed, "Stress and the Female Faculty Member"

This particular bad news isn't exactly surprising or unexpected. But it once again shows the harm that the so-called "difference feminists" can do in their earnest efforts to prove that women are better than men.
The jury's still out on whether women as a group are inherently more nurturing than men. But it is pretty clear from anecdotes as well as this and other studies that the expectation puts an unfair burden on individual women.
I once knew a Chicana writer who taught a couple of classes in the "women's studies" department of the local university. She frequently had to deal with complaints from students that she was insufficiently sympathetic to the "struggles faced by women of color." Needless to say, the complaints invariably came after some student received a lower grade than expected on an assignment or for the course. This woman eventually gave up teaching altogether.

If women are truly more nurturing, does this mean the academy should allow them more time in their schedules to agonize over the personal problems of their students?
Just asking....