Gender in Education: The Informal Education and Beyond Education.

Written by Rayden Sia, edited by Rifqi Faisal and researched by Team MYER.

10 min readJul 31, 2020

Last week we talked about the gender narratives present in the Malaysian education system. We looked at examples of how gender narratives are entrenched in our education syllabus and how these narratives can impact women in society. We also discussed the government’s plans to improve the education syllabus and presented a few proposals of our own.

This week, we’ll be taking a closer look at the implications of the gender narratives in our informal educational system and what we can do to tackle the problem.

An Informal Guide for the Impressionable Child

Though many Malaysians have cut the cord and shifted towards online streaming services to get their dose of entertainment, there are still Malaysians who regularly consume free content from Radio Televisyen Malaysia (RTM) and paid channel subscriptions from Astro.

Shows on Netflix tend to be progressive and feature diverse casts from all backgrounds and many Netflix series and movies such as Sex Education, Pose, The Dragon Prince, and The Half of It feature characters that do not fit the mold of ‘normality’. For example, The Half of It stars Leah Lewis as Ellie Chu, a friendless student who lives with her widowed father and makes extra money writing assignments for her fellow students. Ellie defies the narrative of a love-stricken teenage girl who chases after boys and loves the colour pink. Rather, she is presented as a strong and fiercely independent character with eclectic interests and a strong sense of responsibility.

While much of Hollywood has embraced the need for diversity and inclusivity in media, the Malaysian film industry has yet to fully catch up. A study conducted by researchers from the Infrastructure University of Kuala Lumpur found that stereotypical generalizations of womens’ images still exist in Malaysian television dramas, though to a lesser extent.

By qualitatively analyzing a selection of five popular Malaysian television dramas, they found that while there is strong female representation in leading and supporting roles, the portrayal of women in these dramas is often packaged with ‘dual image orientations’. Despite having dominant roles in the dramas, these characters tend to meet their demise through either disaster, mishap, or death. Beautiful and successful women cannot be merely beautiful and successful. They must be evil and manipulative in contrast with the poor but humble main characters. These comically evil female antagonists are always scheming to destroy their children’s marriages, cursing their love interests upon their death, and even plotting to kill their family members in the name of love.

Though many of us may be amused by these caricatures of women on television, we must remember that we are not the only people watching these shows. Impressionable children may be drawing their own conclusions from these shows. Television aside, we must also look at how we as a society view gender narratives.

In March 2020, the Ministry of Women and Family Development posted a series of graphics directed towards women during the Movement Control Order. These graphics contained messages that endorsed gender stereotypes of both men and women. One graphic taught women how to prevent conflicts between man and wife at home. If the wife were to find her husband slacking off on housework, she is to speak gently and kindly ‘inform’ them of the tasks that he needs to do, only then will he know of to do said task.

This graphic was condemned by many Malaysians online as enforcing gender stereotypes for both men and women. It implied that men are forgetful and aggressive and need to be handled gently lest they become aggressive and that women should be meek and mild to please their husbands. Other graphics in the same series encouraged women to dress formally with full makeup even while at home and to speak to their husbands with a voice like the beloved anime character Doraemon.

Gender Narratives and Higher Education

We can all draw from personal experience times when we were taught not to do this or that because it is not becoming of our gender to do so. Teachers in classrooms do not mean to cause harm when they exclusively elect females or males as class monitors, citing how one gender is more careful and responsible while the other is more commanding and charismatic.

Parents do not mean to cause harm when they encourage their sons to pursue STEM subjects and their daughters to pursue accountancy degrees or a ‘degree in good wifery’. Regardless of their intent, it is clear that this informal education in gender narratives can shape a person’s lifelong attitude towards gender and personal identity.

There is a well-documented gender gap in Malaysian higher education. In 2019, the number of female graduates from public universities was nearly double that of males. In terms of intake and enrolment, females consisted of 60% and 59% of the total respectively. When we look closer at these numbers, we see that females severely outnumber males in terms of intake, enrolment, and output for all fields of study except for engineering (science, mathematics, and computing not included). In engineering, males consist of around 55% of students enrolled and graduated. This difference is minor compared to the disparity between male and female students in other fields, particularly social sciences and education in which the number of females enrolled is almost triple that of males. This data speaks to a major problem with the way we handle gender narratives in Malaysia.

A 2015 study conducted by a researcher in the Faculty of Education, University of Malaya (UM) sought to identify the factors influencing enrolment in Malaysian universities. The study was done by interviewing 167 UM students with self-administered questionnaires and open-ended questions. One of the interesting findings of the study was that the students felt that male and female students have different preferences when it comes to their future careers, with more males aiming to become engineers and more females aiming to become educators. They also felt strongly that the composition of subject choice is different between genders.

This is all well and good until we consider whether students may have made their choice based on societal pressure to conform to an expected role according to their gender. Could it be that males do not pursue careers in social sciences and education because these subjects are traditionally seen as more feminine? Why are there fewer females than males in engineering but not in the other sciences?

The UNESCO director-general Irini Bokova has stated that “such deep inequalities are the result of a wide range of factors, starting with social, cultural and gender norms that influence how girls and boys are brought up, how they interact with family, friends, teachers and the wider community which shape their identity, behaviour, and choices.” Of course, we must also question why there is a significant gap between males and females in higher education enrollment in the first place. Curiously, despite there being many more female graduates than males, males still enjoy better career prospects compared to males.

Examining the Gap

The Statistics on Women Empowerment in Selected Domains, Malaysia, 2019 report prepared by the Department of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) showed that the Malaysia Gender Gap Index (MGGI) 2018 was 0.711, an index of 1 indicating no gap between genders. Despite the numbers we have seen above, the Labour Force Participation Rate (LPPR) and estimated earned income between males and females still showed a significant difference. The LPPR for the years 2016 to 2018 was only 55.2% for women compared to 80.4% for males. For every RM100 earned by males, women receive only RM93.20. Only 14.4% of elected members of parliament were women while women only comprised 17.9% of ministers.

Why is it that even though there are many qualified women in the workforce, males are still more employable and earn more? An article published in the Development Digest in April 2018 revealed that the profit rates of 806 public-listed companies in Malaysia are ‘significantly positively correlated with the presence of females as board members.’ A report published by the McKinsey Global Institue (MGI) showed that an estimated US$50 billion a year can be added to Malaysia’s gross domestic product by 2025 by advancing gender equality in the nation.

What all this means is that companies are not excluding women from their boardrooms out of practicality or a simple concern for the “bottom line”. Despite their capitalistic nature, big publicly listed corporations in Malaysia still discriminate against women for being women in their hiring and promoting practices. There are systematic cultural barriers in place that are preventing women from entering boardrooms and advancing their careers. One could even call this barrier a glass ceiling.

As for women working in science, there are too few. Data from LinkedIn indicates that only 29% of women are in STEM fields in Malaysia. An article in Cleo reported that 32% of teachers believe that young girls lack interest in STEM because of the lack of parental support. One in five females indicated that they would not consider a career in STEM due to gender bias. Malaysia’s own Emeritus Prof Datuk Dr. Mazlan, the first astrophysicist in our country recounts having to make compromises in her career after childbirth.

Gender narratives can also prevent women from entering the uniformed forces. According to The Star, only 4.82% of the Malaysian firefighting force are female. The current quota placed by the Housing and Local Government Ministry for female firefighters is 30%. While women are physically weaker than men, female firefighters are needed in assignments such as spreading awareness on the dangers of fire. The Housing and Local Government Minister, Zuraida Kamaruddin said, “The ability and success of female firefighters are equal to male firefighters who hold important positions in the department.” As of 2016, women make up 10% of the overall strength of the Malaysian Armed Forces and 12% of police officers. In the military, women are generally not recruited into infantry, but are appointed as fighter pilots, paratroopers, and warfare or logistics officers.

Closing the Breach — What We Have Done to Tackle to Problem and What We Have Yet to Do.

Malaysia has been listed by the United Nations as one of the leading nations in encouraging women to participate in science. In 2004, the government committed to having at least 30% of key roles in the public sector be held by women. In 2017, 36% of these roles were held by women. In 2011 and 2015, the government introduced and mandated the policy of having at least 30% women on corporate boards by 2016 and 2020 respectively, making Malaysia the only ASEAN country with such a directive. However, the article published in the Development Digest revealed that only 17% of the board positions in Malaysia were filled by women as of 2018.

Despite the meagre number of women in the uniformed forces, there has been a definite improvement in these figures over the years. From 2012 to 2016, the number of high-ranking women in the police department rose by 25%. At the same time, the Fire and Rescue Department saw the number of female officers increase by 9%. At only 4%, the Malaysian Armed Forces saw the smallest increase in number of women recruited. These figures though small, show that the situation is improving, albeit slowly.

During the lockdown, The Nikkei Asian Review published an article written by Noraida Endut, Professor and Director of the Centre for Research on Women and Gender, Universiti Sains Malaysia. In the opinion piece, the author argued that a specific measure of the MCO whereby only one person, the “head of the family” is allowed to go out to buy groceries. She stated that “despite there being close to 240,000 single mothers in Malaysia, who are likely in charge of their households, the presumption remains strong that the head of the family is a man.”

She also argued that the MCO worsened the already unequal distribution of work in a family. She stated that “In his speech persuading citizens to stay in, Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said: “Mothers now have more time at home and they can try all sorts of new recipes to cook for the family.” This remark missed the point: far from giving mothers a break, the MCO actually requires them to continue fulfilling their job obligations while concurrently playing the primary caregiving role.”

Malaysia currently trails in global gender equality rankings. The Global Gender Gap Index report for 2020 shows that Malaysia ranks 104th out of 153 countries. This is mostly due to the disparity in labour participation between the genders. We cannot deny that, despite the blunders along the way, there have been sincere efforts to reduce gender inequality in our nation. This does not mean that we can be content. We, the youth of the nation have to dare to demand more from the people in charge. We have to challenge the status quo of having those burdened-with-the-weight-of-their-years forever in charge.

The Crux of the Problem

The problems we discussed above cannot be distilled down to just gender narratives. They are multi-faceted problems that stem from culture, education, religion, and societal identity. However, we cannot deny that gender narratives play a significant role in the matter. We, as a nation, have a long way to go before achieving true equality among genders. Individuals should not be forced into certain paths and be judged by the characteristics of the average of their gender.

They should be viewed as what they are — individuals with their own preferences and ambitions. We have to knock down the barriers that stop individuals from achieving their aspirations and fulfilling their full potential. Equality does not mean brute-forcing a perfect 1:1 ratio of males to females in every field, but ensuring that everyone has the equal opportunity to explore their full potential.