Thursday, October 23, 2008

• “Though more women have become faculty members, most of them are at the lower levels”
• “Many women are also not motivated enough, feeling restricted by their dual career”

Chennai: There needs to be a change in the attitude of both institutions and women themselves to ensure gender equality in the senior management of higher education.

That is the message being driven home at the UGC workshop on capacity-building in higher education management being held at Anna University this week.


“Though more women have entered the profession as faculty over the past decade, most of them are at the lower levels, with a few in senior academic, administration or management positions,” said Karuna Chanana, resource person for the workshop and a member of the UGC’s National Consultative Committee on the issue.

“Institutions don’t provide enough opportunities, but many women are also not motivated enough, feeling restricted by their dual career, with responsibilities in the home.”

When Anna University Vice-Chancellor P. Mannar Jawahar visited one of his university departments at 9:30 a.m. last week, he found that eight faculty members had still not turned up, though the working hours had begun an hour earlier. Six of the eight were women. Half an hour before college ended at 4:30 p.m., all women faculty members in another department had gone home. “Women must be committed to their work, not constantly think of home concerns while in office…” This culture must change. Only then can women come up in equal numbers.”

Dr. Chanana returned the ball to the university’s court, saying it was the responsibility of heads of department to ensure discipline among all faculty, including women. “You should see to it that women are held to the same standards,” she said. “Also collect a statistical database on how many men are coming in late.”

The five-day workshop will focus on providing sensitivity, awareness and motivation to the 25 women who have gathered from institutions across the State. The key topics include the role of women in governance, academic leadership and research and guidelines on how to balance personal and professional goals, use networking and push for better opportunities.

“We can ask for support, but not concessions. We need to come up on our own merits,” said K. Hemalatha, a Mathematics professor at Anna University and regional coordinator for the UGC programme.

Such workshops will be held across the State, and the best participants will be selected to move on to the second stage of train the trainer programmes. The UGC also intends translating training manuals into regional languages and developing modules to address specific concerns.