The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

Michael Apple seems to be one of the big names in educational theory as far as the politics of textbooks go. I'm reading about three of his books right now, including Teachers and Texts: A Political Economy of Class & Gender Relations in Education. So far I'm loving it--and even though it was published in 1986, it feels just as relevant today as it must have 25 years ago. Take this little nugget as an example: when talking about how teaching, a profession dominated by women in the 20th century (especially at the elementary level), is increasingly controlled and managed by male administrators (i.e. superintendents, principals, and curriculum designers), Apple observes

It is the history of the state, in concert with capital and a largely male academic body of consultants and developers, intervening at the level of practice into the work of a largely female workforce. That is, ideologies of gender, of sex-appropriate knowledge, need to be seen as having possibly played a significant part here. The loss of control and rationalization of one's work forms part of a state/class/gender 'couplet' that works its way out in the following ways. Mathematics and science teaching are seen as abysmal. 'We' need rapid change in our economic responsiveness and in 'our' emerging ideological and economic struggle with the Soviet Union.

Whoa. Substitute "China" for "Soviet Union" in that excerpt, and it could have been written yesterday. Even putting the global superpower competition element aside, the very same conversations are had in education today about our woeful inadequacies in teaching math and science (which, as someone who has spent a fair amount of time observing math classrooms recently, I have to say is completely warranted). How much are these inadequacies tied to the fact that (mostly women) teachers are constricted by the texts and curriculum they are required to follow by (mostly male) administrators, bureaucrats, and politicians, rather than exercise their professional expertise in guiding classes according to the needs of their students? A lot, in my opinion!