EDUCATION Male teachers typically shun the early grades

Low pay and lack of respect are reasons men don't teach preschoolers.
SCRIPPS HOWARD
In the world of diapers, building blocks and naptime, Steve Weber is a rarity: He teaches young children in a profession dominated by women.
Weber, who teaches preschoolers with special needs in rural Onamia, Minn., is scheduled to get his doctorate this month, and he already has an answer for those who ask what he'll do next: He's been doing it since 1984.
"This is all the status I need," Weber said.
Across the country, states and school districts are confronting the highest disproportion of male and female teachers in 40 years. While the shortage of male teachers is high in all areas, it is starkest in early education and day care -- fewer than 5 percent of early educators are men, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
In elementary and middle school, 18 percent of teachers are men; in high school, 45 percent are men.
Ask male teachers why they have so few counterparts and they recite a laundry list of reasons: low pay, lack of respect and difficult working conditions.
Misperceptions
Add to that a misperception that teaching is a job for women and that there are sometimes unwarranted suspicions of male teachers as potential abusers, according to Bryan Nelson, director of MenTeach, a clearinghouse aimed at recruiting male teachers. Men, he said, are often unfairly looked askance at, even though women are also capable of abuse. "I don't want to deny [abuse] happens, but it's disproportionate to the amount of fear that goes on," Nelson said. Nelson said the teaching profession should represent the world around it -- he would like to see as the proportion of men and women teachers reflect the statistics of the nation. "Children need strong, nurturing men and women in their daily lives," he said.
While education groups across the board recognize a shortage of male teachers, many recognize that not enough is being done to combat it. Groups such as Recruiting New Teachers and Troops to Teachers, which trains former service members to be teachers, have helped, but the shortage remains.