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Mensline
October 2003
Voicemail
Volume 1 Issue 6
The “Peter Ellis” Syndrome
With the release of a
study this week by the NZ Educational Institute which shows that men now make
up less than 20 per cent of the male primary school teaching force, a new
cause has been identified as keeping men out of teaching and causing them to
leave - being seen as a potential paedophile.
You would think that the two other reasons given for this drop - low pay and low social status - would
be easily fixed. Since there is no shortage of teachers overall, you would
simply offer male teachers a premium?
Wrong! Even to specify a desired gender in a job advertisement is illegal let
alone offer a pay difference. Yet funnily enough I do recall seeing ads on TV
doing this very thing to attract teachers based on race difference.
Yet it is this “Peter Ellis” Syndrome that would give men most concern. After
all, it was the NZEI that made it officially dangerous for male teachers
around students by instituting a "no contact" policy after the
Peter Ellis case.
An Auckland University education researcher,
Alison Jones, found that this policy reinforced anxiety rather than
addressing it. She says that the Peter Ellis case "was widely seen as an example of social hysteria rather than
sexual abuse".
According to one former teacher, teaching had become “cold, calculated and way too PC”.
“Teachers are terrified if
a girl enters their class during breaks or before or after school. It's
become so unnatural. If a girl falls over and grazes her knee, you can't pick
her up or give her a Band-Aid. You have to send someone to the other side of
the school to get a nurse or a female teacher.”
Principal
Trevor Nicholls, a teacher at Kokopu School near Whangarei, for 19 years
feels it's time male teachers stood up for the profession - and for
themselves. He's sure there are many other male teachers who, like him, feel
that "if a kid needs support,
needs help, they're going to give it. It's just human nature", even
at the risk of getting themselves into strife.
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