Women's participation in educational management: A Trinidad and Tobago perspective

Abstract

This study uses an interactionist perspective to examine the careers of a small group of women teachers. It uses the concept of “subjective career” to capture the meaning that women administrators give to the circumstances that shaped their career decisions at crucial points. The focus is on successful women—school principals, school supervisors, directors of educational institutions and women faculty at the university—exploring their own interpretations of their career success and reasons for it. Data were collected through unstructured interviews, and the discussion uses extracts from the interviews to illustrate the important themes: 1) carer commitment, 2) domestic responsibility, 3) image of management, 4) sponsors and mentors, and 5) discrimination on the job.