We live in a society where the care of children still falls quite disproportionately on women. Some progress has been made on that front in recent decades, but no serious observer would claim that we are even approaching an equal sharing of the burdens of raising children between men and women.
This reality has important effects on teaching, which remains a disproportionately female profession: women teachers are more likely to have interrupted their teaching career to take a parenting and child care leave. As a consequence, women teachers are more likely to arrive at age 55 with less than thirty years of service.
One of the important benefits of the 55-25 pension improvement that is often lost in discussion is that it creates greater equity for women teachers, by making it easier for them to retire at an age comparable to their male colleagues. This is an issue of fairness, but it is also a question of building a strong profession of career educators. Women will be more likely to commit to teaching as a life-long profession if they know they will not be penalized for taking a few years off to raise their own children.
2 Comments:
1 Steve Perez
· Oct 19, 2007 at 1:52 pm
Peter Goodman has more to say at Ed in the Apple.
2 55/25 And Voluntary School-Wide Bonuses: Reaction | Edwize
· Oct 19, 2007 at 6:55 pm
[...] look at the gender equity aspect of 55/25, here at Edwize: One of the important benefits of the 55-25 pension improvement that is often lost in discussion is [...]