Curriculum, culture, ideology and ownership: the case of the Exploring Masculinities programme

Abstract

This article considers curriculum ownership, contestation and the relationship between curriculum and culture through the lens of the Exploring Masculinities (EM) programme. The programme was developed in the late 1990s to meet the social and personal needs of young men. As its dissemination was being planned, it became the subject of critical attention from some high-profile journalists and certain parent bodies. This article reports on a follow-up study of a national sample of parents regarding the inclusion of EM issues on the school curriculum. It also draws on interviews with journalists who were at the centre of the related media debate. The macro curriculum issues are discussed in light of this data along with one key issue identified by parents, namely the professional competence of teachers around social and personal issues.

Keywords:

• curriculum ideology
• culture
• parents
• media
• teacher competence

Acknowledgements

The first two phases of this research were funded by the Gender Equality Unit, Department of Education and Science, Dublin.

Notes

1. For example, ‘Balance: Who cares?’ and ‘Exploring Sex Stereotyping’.

2. There is a strong tradition of single-sex schooling in Ireland. In 2000, some 38% of Irish post-primary students were attending single-sex schools and one-third of all post-primary schools were single sex (DES 2003). While single-sex schooling is on the decline, 16% of boys attended single-sex post-primary schools in 1999–2000 when EM was being developed.

3. This includes Transition Year (a one year optional programme between the junior and senior cycle which is taken by 40% of a year's cohort) and senior cycle boys (DES 2000).

4. AMEN is a ‘voluntary group providing a confidential helpline, information and support service for male victims of domestic violence and their children’ (AMEN publicity information cited in Mac an Ghaill, Hanafin, and Conway 2004, 107).

5. Pinar et al. (2004) v ‘curriculum as gendered text’. Lynch (1989, 52) saw schools as ‘the principal public institutions in society for legitimating cultural forms’ adding that ‘by not credentialising, or by only partly credentialising, particular cultural practices, [schools] marginalise and demean them’ (Lynch 1989).

6. Reflecting in particular the thinking of Lawton.

7. They identified four aspects of the relationship between education and culture – cultural heritage, socio-political culture, the developing culture and the unified culture including the artistic-literary and scientific-technological traditions.

8. Both categories are called parents in this article.

9. Congress of Catholic School Parents Association (CSPA); Parents Association for Vocational Schools and Community College (PAVSCC); Federation of Christian Brothers and other Catholic Schools Parents Council (FEDCBS); Parent Association for Community and Comprehensive Schools (PACCS); Co-operation of Minority Religion and Protestant Parents Association (COMPASS).

10. CSPA did not hold an annual conference in 2008. Members were invited to participate via email with the use of Survey Monkey.

11. O'Brien and Waters write opinion columns in The Irish Times for whom Myers also wrote before transferring to the Irish Independent while Quinn writes opinion columns for The Irish Independent and The Irish Catholic, amongst other papers.

12. As defined by TALIS in opposition to exchange-based.