Gender inequalities among Students in Visual Art Education in selected Senior High Schools in Kumasi Metropolis
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Date
2021-06-09
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Abstract
Gender equality has been a topic of interest to many organizations and governments
over the years. For example, Millennium Development Goals 2 and 3 underline the
significance of ensuring equal access for girls and boys to education, eliminating
gender inequalities in main and secondary education, creating equal education
programmes and curricula, and offering adequate resources to monitor and implement
equitable education reforms. Moreover, several gender-specific projects such as the
establishment of the Girls ' Education Unit (GEU) in 1997 and the Ministry of
Women and Children's Affairs (MOWAC) in 2001, the introduction of food rations
and schemes for disadvantaged girls, especially at elementary and secondary level, to
attain the MDGs by 2015. All these have been done to bridge the gap between the two
genders in the whole educational system in Ghana. However, one may ask that for all
these interventions, is the visual art programme affected positively? Therefore this
study sought to analysis some gender inequalities among students in visual art
education in Ghana with the following objectives; (i) To find out how male and
female students of visual art are distributed in the chosen high schools in Kumasi
Metropolis, (ii) To identify and discuss the causes of inequalities in the population
and distribution of male and female students offering Visual Art education and (iii)
To propose appropriate interventions to promote gender equality among the
population and distribution of male and female students offering Visual Art in
selected Schools. The descriptive research under the qualitative method was
employed. Proportionate stratified sampling technique was to choose One Hundred
and fifty (150) Visual Art students and Six (6) teachers from two schools participated
in the study. The teachers indicated that the programme is not biased towards any of
the sexes in relation to accessing Visual Art Education in their respective schools,
thus both males and females have equal access. However, data obtained shows that
enrollment of female students into the programme for the 2018/2019 academic year
was 24.9% as against 75.1% for the male enrollment. Some female students feels they
are not motivated enough in that only few of their teachers are females. Some other
female students bemoaned that some male colleagues and even some teachers
discourage them during practical assignments. The researchers suggested among
others that the Education Ministry through the Education Service of Ghana should
recruit more female teachers in the art programmes in the country's several senior
high schools. Also, Visual Art teachers should encourage their female students by
motivating them in order increase enrollment in the subsequent academic years.
Description
A thesis submitted to the Department of Educational Innovations in Science and
Technology, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial
fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy in Art Education
Keywords
Gender inequalities, Visual Art Education, Senior High Schools, Kumasi Metropolis