A Mid- To Late Twentieth-Century Case Study of a Male Public School Professional

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GENDER PRIVILEGE AND THE CULTURE OF THE ONTARIO SCHOOL SYSTEM:A MID-TO LATE TWENTIETH-CENTURY CASE STUDY OF A MALE PUBLICSCHOOL PROFESSIONALAnalyze the experiences of Barry Jackson as a teacher and principal in Ontario between the1950s and1980s, focusing on the social, economic, and gender-related factors that influenced hiscareer. How do his experiences both conform to and diverge from the broader trends identified inthe research by Reynolds (1990, 1995) and other scholars in educational history? In yourresponse, discuss the role of credentialism, the gender dynamics in the profession, and the impactof local school board organization on Barry’s career development.Word count requirement:1,500-2,000 words

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This study uses an adapted public history methodology of a local case study to analyzeinterviews conducted with a former Ontario teacher and principal. It draws on literature andhistorical documents regarding teaching between the 1950s–1980s to examine the typicalexperience of public school professionals in that time and discuss structural trends and beliefsregarding credentialism, local school board organization, and gender in the Ontario educationsystem.Since a publicly financed education system was established throughout Canada in the nineteenthcentury, the educational policies and regulations governing teachers, students, and curriculumhave been the jurisdiction of the provinces. As many researchers, such as Cavanagh (2003), havenoted, within the province of Ontario, the working conditions of individual teachers variedwidely until the 1960s. This was primarily the result of vague provincial legislation whichallowed regional school boards and communities to determine the specific responsibilities ofteachers, negotiate salaries, and fund schools.Across Ontario, the organization of school boards varied before the 1950s. Schools were groupedinto city or county districts or inspectorates. Within the inspectorate divisions, there was littleconsistency in the organizational structure. Generally, each inspectorate was composed ofnumerous school boards. The guidelines governing school board boundaries were hazy, but eachschool board usually had at least one open school (Ontario Department of Education [ODE],1953). In his book,The Schools of Ontario,1876–1976, Stamp (1982) described how theDepartment of Education pushed towards increased centralization in the late 1950s and early1960s. School boards were amalgamated into township-sized boards and larger central schools

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were constructed. Only a few years later, these boards were again amalgamated into countywideboards.The historical “independence of local school boards,” the “provincial constitutional autonomy ineducation,” and “the relative paucity of research in educational history,” contribute to Harrigan’s(1986) conclusion that “it is within . . . local case studies that we find some of the mostinformative research” (p. 81). As a result, I have chosen to explore the experience of publicschool professionals by focusing on one subject, my maternal grandfather Barry Jackson. In thisanalysis, I adapt the public history methodological style to explore Barry’s career using tworecorded interviews conducted with Barry in March 2010, and drawing from historical accountsand studies on the teaching profession, including research by Reynolds (1990,1995). To date,Reynolds has conducted one of the most comprehensive analyses of teachers who becameprincipals in Ontario between the 1940s and 1980s. Reynolds interviewed male and femaleprincipals in the Toronto school board (approximately 220 km away from Barry’s home town).While attempts have been made not to over-generalize the typicality of the Toronto teachers,comparisons between Barry’s experiences and those of Reynolds’ interviewees do allows forhypotheses to be constructed regarding the typicality of Barry’s experiences. I focus on the startof his career in the 1950s, his decision to pursue professional qualifications, and his promotion toprincipalship as I explore how his experiences both confirm and reject the “typical” experienceof public school professionals from the 1950s to the 1980s. Barry’s career in educationhighlights the culture of Ontario’s rural school system at the mid-twentieth century. Barry’saccount of how he was hired as a teacher, his decision to make teaching his career, and why hebecame a principal also highlight the pervasive gender imbalances within the profession. Inmany ways, Barry’s experiences were typical of male teachers at the time, but male teachers

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were only a small percent of the teaching force, and this minority had a markedly differentexperience when compared to female teachers.Kenneth Barry Jackson was born on March 17, 1934, on the family homestead at Paudash Lake,near Bancroft, Ontario. In this rural area, lumber was one of the main industries. Barry’s father,Gord, was a lumberman and a farmer. Gord only attended school to Grade 8 but was a veryintelligent man. Barry’s mother, Ruby, was a teacher. Ruby taught before the birth of her firstchild, and she returned to teaching on an occasional basis in the 1950s.According to research conducted by Reynolds (1990), Barry’s family background was much likethe background of most teachers at the time. Reynolds (1990) found that the fathers of theindividuals who became teachers in the 1950s and 1960s were often clerical workers, labourers,or farmers. Like Barry, their mothers were often employed before marriage. Furthermore, like71% of Ontario teachers in 1961, Barry’s ethnic background is British. As Reynolds (1990)noted, the percentage of educators of British ancestry was more than 10% higher than thepercentage of individuals of British ancestry in the Ontario labour force (p. 117).Various coincidences led to Barry beginning his career as a teacher. Barry had not planned onbecoming a teacher (personal communication, March 3, 2010). At nineteen years old, and havingbeen one of the few youth in his community to complete Grade 13, Barry postponed finding ajob after graduation. Instead, he decided to concentrate on playing in his all-star Ontario baseballteam until the season was over. Barry believed that having completed Grade 13 he could get anyentry-level job he wanted. He assumedhe would work in the hydroelectric industry or with BellCanada. Instead, his career in education began fortuitously when, two weeks before the schoolyear began, the district inspector phoned and offered Barry a position teaching a one-roomschoolhouse in Ormsby, Ontario. Barry believes there were three reasons why the inspector

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decided to approach him with the job offer: he knew Barry had finished Grade 13, he knew Rubywas a teacher, and he knew Barry was familiar with the culture of rural schools, having attendedone himself (personal communication, March 3, 2010).Barry accepted the offer and was sent to work in Ormsby where he was responsible for teachingforty-one students in Grades 1 to 8 (personal communication, March 3, 2010). This was abovethe average student to teacher ratio in Canada. According to Harrigan (1992), the average ratiowas 1 teacher per 28 students in 1950, and 1 teacher per 27 students in 1955. Being well abovethe average was somewhat due to the rural school system at the time, which struggled with thedifficulties brought on by the low population density and lack of centralized township schools.This high ratio was somewhat normal, as Harrigan (1992) noted, “historically Ontario ha[d] thehighest ratio” of students per teacher in Canada and “these maintained over time until 1960” (p.505).Barry was able to be employed as a teacher without any training because he had a letter ofpermission from the Department of Education (ODE, 1953). As Cavanagh (2003) noted, theMinister of Education gave these letters to men and women, granting them permission “to teachin Ontario schools without any kind of teacher training” (p. 43). Letters of permission were verycommon when Barry began teaching in 1953. According to the Ontario Department of Education(1953) records, 16 of the 66 teachers in Barry’s inspectorate were working with letters ofpermission. Stamp (1982) noted that letters of permission were granted in high numbers in

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response to the “crisis in teacher supply” (p. 198) caused by the post-war baby boom. Thisdemographic shift meant that when Barry graduated Grade 13 in 1953 there was a record numberof children starting school. The letters of permission system was one way that the province triedto combat the teacher shortage. However, this letter appears to have been a mere formality andhad little effect on Barry. When asked if he applied for the letter of permission, Barry laughedand replied, “Oh no. I didn’t even know I had one!” (personal communication, March 11, 2010).Barry’s decision to take his first teaching job and later to make the profession his career, wassupported by his family in a manner that appears to be atypical of the experiences of maleteachers in the 1950s. In the interviews Reynolds (1995) conducted, the men who becameteachers between 1930 and 1970 expressed how “others' reactions to their choice to teach wasoften problematic” (p. 134). The men “all agreed that little social acceptance had been accordedtheir decision to become a teacher” (p. 99–100). One male interviewee recalled, “My fatherthought it was terrible. . . . He said: ‘Why the hell, they’re all women down there’” (p. 101).Reynolds (1995) concludes that the typical male teachers who began working between 1930 and1970 found that “becoming teachers . . . contravened many of the extra-organizational rules theyand others understood about manhood. The benefits of teaching and the security it offered,however, still made it attractive” (p. 135). Barry’s experiences both conform to and reject thischaracterization.For Barry, his decision to become a teacher did not meet the same social disapproval thatReynolds described. When asked what motivated him to become a teacher, Barry recalls,I had neverthoughtof being a teacher. . . . I was . . . playing ball, and just going, and the onlything was my mum said, “Why don’t you try it? You have nothing else to do.” And I thought,“okay, why not?” I never thought of being a teacher until . . . they asked. No planning or like that

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