Virginia Mathematics Teacher Spring 2017

mathematical performance for women, and consid- ering that we live in a world where gender stereo- types are constantly reinforced at every turn, it’s no wonder that women not only experience more anx- iety when it comes to mathematical evaluations, but that even when they do perform well, that they do not attribute their success to innate ability but rather to effort. An Imposter Among us The idea of girls performing well yet not taking accountability for results is called Imposter Syndrome (Spencer et al, 1999). Characterized by a deep sense of not-belonging despite proven ability, I think that this is what’s really at the heart of the gender gap when it comes to STEM. In a sense, Stereotype Threat may prevent some women from ever performing well on task, but Imposter Syn- drome is what prevents those women who have managed to beat Stereotype Threat from ever reap- ing their hard earned reward – it’s what prevents women from actually entering the field despite how hard they may have worked in order to be able to do so. Achievement has frequently been corre- lated to mathematical self-concept and those who believe in this correlation argue that there is a re- ciprocal relationship between success/identification and failure/dis-identification. Thus, if a student consistently succeeds at mathematics, he/she should begin to incorporate math into their self- concept. One might presume that high achievement in a field of study such as math would lead one to identify as a “learner of math,” making math more congruent with one’s self. However, it turns out that even when girls achieve and are successful, they still do not incorporate “mathematician” into their identities (Ma and Kishor’s (1997), as cited in Wang, 2006, p.702). Essentially, Imposter Syn- drome leads girls to believe that even if they achieve high grades in their math classes, that they simply just ‘frauds’ waiting to be exposed. I teach many girls who feel this way, who despite achiev- ing some of the highest math marks in their classes nonetheless feel that they had to work harder than everyone else, rendering their success illegitimate. Similarly, girls will attribute their high grades to their evaluations being too easy, or their teachers being ‘nice’ to them. Rarely do I see a female stu- dent who proudly boasts that yes, she scored a high

grade because she is smart and has a firm grasp of the material. What’s interesting is that over years of speaking to students from different schools and demographics about their believes in mathematical ability, there have been a few interesting loopholes that have stood out to me as places where we can take action in order to flip the switch. Many of my students from single-sex schools have balked at the idea that stereotypes would ever get in the way of their pursuit of a STEM field, in fact claiming that societal stereotypes motivate them to prove these stereotypes wrong! The culture of their schools is such that these students are constantly being told that girls can do absolutely anything, that stereo- types that tell them otherwise are false. Going back to the idea that Stereotype Threat occurs in spaces where the presence of negative stereotypes is most prevalent, this explains why many girls that go to these types of schools are not affected by Stereo- type Threat or Imposter Syndrome. Similarly, many of my students who are simply not interested in mainstream popular media also exhibit the same attitudes and performance as those girls attending single-sex schools. I think that this is an interesting point as it showcases the depth and breadth of the problem: this is a societal thing, something huge that extends across mass media, that reaches mil- lions and millions of people. This isn’t something relegated to our classroom walls, and in fact, the work we do as teachers in order to fight it is met by billion dollar corporations who are trying to tell our kids otherwise in order to keep them in their neat and tidy gendered boxes. So what can we do as teachers in order to change the landscape once and for all? Flipping The Switch As teachers, we have many roles to play out in the classroom and I think that it’s especially im- portant to note that we are the ones with direct ac- cess to students, and in turn the ones with a great degree of ability to change the equation. While of- ten we get discouraged by evidence that shows us that on such a large scale it appears that the perva- siveness and power of these stereotypes trumps our work in the classroom, I strongly believe that the opposite is true! Knowing how gender identity af- fects our students empowers us to work on the ground level to educate and inform them, which

Virginia Mathematics Teacher vol. 43, no. 2

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