In female-dominated academic disciplines, male college students face distinct challenges, such as lagging admission and graduation rates when compared to their female counterparts. To address this concerning trend and enhance support for male students, online educators should embrace a gender-adapted, culturally responsive teaching approach. This approach enables instructors to understand and support male student academic performance and tailor their educational strategies to enhance a male student's sense of belonging and engagement in the course. By adopting this approach, online educators can help male students cultivate a pro-social, strengths-based self-perception, fostering a positive sense of identity as learners, men, and future professionals. This approach emphasizes how their masculinity can be a source of strength, enabling them to derive maximum benefit from their educational journey and make meaningful contributions to their academic pursuits.
TopIntroduction
Virtual learning offers cost-effective, convenient, flexible, and high-quality education to students (Cavinato et al., 2021; Kim & Park, 2020). However, it has also brought attention to a growing gender disparity in higher education, particularly the concerning trend of men falling behind women. Research findings indicate that men may encounter difficulties when it comes to initiating and sustaining engagement with classmates and professors in online learning environments, ultimately impacting their academic performance (Yaghmour, 2012). Male students may also find it difficult navigating online classrooms in female-dominated academic areas (e.g., nursing, education, counseling, social work). Several studies, over the last few decades, have investigated the effects and experiences of female students in male-dominated academic disciplines (Dresden et al., 2018; Steele et al., 2002), but little attention has been given to male student’s experience of the converse.
Male students may experience social isolation, lack of access to academic support, including advisement and supervision (Williams, 2015), which can limit their opportunities for networking and professional development. Furthermore, male students pursuing fields of study where they are underrepresented, such as nursing, elementary education, and mental health, have faced significant challenges that have led to a higher dropout rate. These challenges include inadequate mentoring, social isolation, and the perception of discrimination (Lou et al., 2011; Severiens & ten Dam, 2012).
To address these challenges and enhance male students' learning experiences in female-dominated academic courses, virtual learning environments should be tailored to accommodate diverse learning styles among men, ways of relating to classmates, and styles of interacting with course material. This can be achieved by better equipping virtual educators to connect and support male students, and offer engaging content, and incorporating collaborative activities that may be more appealing to men’s interest and learning styles.
Research examining male students and how masculinity relates to the online learning experience has been under-researched (Sbaratta & Tirpak, 2015), particularly in terms of how educators can effectively connect with and support male students. In this chapter, we will review an expanding body of research that sheds light on male students' learning outcomes and explore how educators can adapt their approach to better connect with, support, and meet the educational needs of male students in female-dominated online learning environments.