more focus group findings - Cardiff U

Cardiff University Focus Groups: Lecturing Staff

At Cardiff University we undertook focus groups with lecturing staff and graduate students. Karin has summarised the graduate student groups [Editor: see previous post], but we found some different results amongst the lecturing staff.

We conducted two focus groups with lecturing staff:

* Female only group of six participants, ranging from senior professors to researchers on fixed-term contracts, and including staff from the practical as well as the academic degree programs.
* Mixed group of eight participants with two women and six men. Staff represented different levels of seniority, and both ‘sides’ of the department.

Both focus groups were very successful with all participants talking freely and openly about their experiences within the department. In the female only group, participants were initially hesitant to bring up any concerns, explaining how the situation within the department was much more supportive than previous places of work. However, as the discussion progressed, more issues arose. Everyone felt that major problems surrounding gender inequality did not exist, but they were concerned about more subtle instances – for example feeling their views were being ignored in meetings. Similarly, participants cited the influence of ‘male dominated social groups’ such as fantasy football leagues, which acted as informal networks within the department.

In the mixed group, there was a consensus that the department had little to worry about in terms of gender, and instead the conversation focused on the way that gender influences the students they teach. Participants discussed how students still mainly interact within gendered groups in the classroom, and how female students speak out less than their male colleagues. When the moderator fed back some of the concerns shared by the female only group, the discussion started to consider how these issues intersect with age and seniority. A couple of male participants who have been at the department for less than five years said they shared some of the feelings of invisibility at meetings and in the corridor. They emphasised the need to consider how gender intersects with age, race and sexuality, rather than seeing it as an isolated factor.

The main conclusion to be drawn was the importance of the research, and how much participants had enjoyed the focus group, after some initial scepticism about its usefulness.

Focus group findings at Cardiff

Here are some of the main points that came out of our focus group interviews with graduate students at Cardiff University:

We conducted two focus groups:
(1) Female-only: Six participants from Taiwan, Korea, Norway, Wales & PRC – from 2nd to final year of study.
(2) Mixed: Five participants: Three male, two female – from first to final year of study.

In general, the students felt that the school provides an open and non-discriminatory environment. However, they are aware of structural inequalities -- suggesting that gender, age, status, ‘race’, and family.

Students suggest that social networks, often based on gender, determine access to teaching opportunities, research assistance and mentoring.

Though few feel that gender has affected their careers so far, all are aware of the gender pay gap in academia.

Students emphasised the need for more formal and informal mentoring. They also called for union/association action on gender issues related to teaching, research, admin, funded projects, hiring, promotion, etc.

Posted by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen

Welcome to the Gendered Experiences Project

This blog has been created for the FSD project on studying the gendered realities of academic life in communication and media studies disciplines through focus group research, interviews and individual stories.

The project has been going since 2001. We’re collecting collect data that we can use for advocacy and academic research, within ICA and beyond. We have already held roundtables and conference sessions at several ICA conferences, and want to conduct more research in the area, and publish journal articles to increase awareness.

The issue of gender equity in higher education has been the focus of much research over the past thirty years. However, the experience of women academics in communication and media studies has received scant attention. Statistics show that even though there are more women today with advanced degrees in academic departments everywhere, they remain concentrated in the lower ranks of all disciplines, and often experience discrimination. Nevertheless, researchers have also found that women in the discipline have more extensive social and professional support networks.

If you would like to be part of an exciting international network of feminist scholars conducting research in this area, and to gain access to the data we’re collecting, please get in touch with the project coordinator, Karin Wahl-Jorgensen: wahl-jorgensenk (AT) cf.ac.uk

Please help us by posting to this blog:
(1) How can we fight inequality? Strategies for change
What are some strategies for change, at the personal and collective level, that have worked for you?

(2) Data from research on gendered realities of academic life

(3) Your own stories about the role of gender in academic life
Share your own experience about the role of gender in academic life. Can you think of any occasion when gender has made a difference to your life as an academic? How does gender affect your teaching? How does it affect your research? How does it shape your interactions with colleagues and students?

(4) Advice on how to do the research
If you’re participating in the research project, this is the place to post your thoughts on it. For example, which focus group questions worked, and which ones didn’t? What is your experience of getting through the IRB process? Do you have any other ideas for how to conduct research on gender in academic life?