Males and Tertiary Education in Jamaica is the result of five years’ qualitative research examining the relationship between men and tertiary education. Herbert Gayle and Peisha Bryan focus on the lived experiences and perceptions of three sets of young men: those who did not qualify to enter university; those who qualified but bypassed tertiary education; and those who qualified but for varying reasons have delayed entry into university. Using rigorous, in-depth interviews to capture the lived experiences of 186 males between the ages of eighteen and thirty-nine years, compared to those of 74 females of the same comparative age group, the authors examine the realities of males regarding their wish or ability to attend university in Jamaica. They found that men’s comparative absence from universities in Jamaica is cultural. Spurred by the world phenomenon of women’s liberation, Jamaican families shifted their support towards educating women to the effect that female enrolment in tertiary institutions increased from 64 per cent of men in 1971 to 228 per cent of men in 2011. Participation in tertiary education in Jamaica is unquestionably gendered and this work is the first and book-length scholarly response to the question of why men are not attracted to tertiary education in Jamaica.
List of Tables
List of Figures
List of Charts
Preface
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction
1 Background to the Study
2 Not Qualified for Tertiary Education
3 Qualified for Tertiary Education but Bypassed
4 Qualified for Tertiary Education but Delaying Entry
5 Summary and Discussion of Findings
Notes
References
Index
Herbert Gayle is Lecturer in Social Anthropology, Department of Sociology, Psychology and Social Work, the University of the West Indies, Mona, Jamaica.
Peisha Bryan is Programme Director, Vision 2030 Jamaica Secretariat, Planning Institute of Jamaica, Kingston, Jamaica.
PREFACE
For decades, executives of the University of the West Indies (UWI) have lamented at graduation ceremonies that the proportion of males is constantly dwindling. In 2007 the intake at the Mona Campus dropped to an alarming 20 per cent for males and this was made public. Something is radically wrong here, people opined. The panic responses came with the usual Caribbean drama. There were articles in the print media, various discussions on radio, and meetings throughout the region. The response almost gave the impres- sion that the problem was new. The United Nations Children Fund (UNICEF) was among the international groups that responded to the “new concern” for males in Jamaica. The organization has had a long history of highlighting the plight of boys in Jamaica, especially as it relates to investment in educa- tion. In the 1990s they sponsored the first regional study on males known as “The Male Socialization Project”, from which came Chevannes’s 2001 study Learning to Be a Man. Between 2007 and 2008 some of UNICEF’s sponsored studies on boys were published, chief of which was material on the immense neglect of boys in Jamaica.1 By the end of 2007 UNICEF had worked with the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) to host a conference aimed at examining male participation in education in the region.