had taken charge of the course of their lives and careers. (Guinier et al., Becoming
Gentlemen, 33 n. 86)
- This institutional hypothesis does a somewhat better job of explaining differences
found among different kinds of law schools, because there are women from a variety of
backgrounds in many law schools (although admittedly, the distribution may vary). Pres-
sure for conformity can obviously be exerted in multiple ways, including through the re-
sponses of students to one another and to the professor in the classroom, in addition to
the more obvious top-down channels. Female professors can themselves be subject to in-
stitutional pressures, which may vary systematically in ways we have yet to uncover.
- Yale Law Women, Yale Law School. Students in these classes monitored between
2 and 7 class meetings in each course (averaging around 4 meetings), tracking aspects of
student turns. This study introduced some new approaches not found in the earlier Yale
observational effort: here volunteered turns were distinguished from called-on turns, and
responses were characterized as “response,” “question,” or “comment.” Student monitors
also noted the attendance for each class session coded and calculated participation as a
ratio of students actually present each day, where possible. (There are arguments for and
against using overall class enrollment rather than daily attendance for ratios, but certainly
the approach adopted required additional work and showed a very thoughtful effort. It
also has the benefit of yielding data on gendered patterns of attendance for the classes that
were monitored.)
- Id., 36. If a strict rule for delineating female- versus male-dominated participa-
tion is used, categorizing even classes in which one group exceeds the other by a ratio of
only 1.007, for example, then the distribution of gender domination looks fairly even (with
12 classes dominated by men and 11 dominated by women.) However, if we remove classes
in which the ratio of male-female total turns is essentially even (any classes in which the
ratio ranges from .97 to 1.03), then the distribution shifts considerably, because all of those
classes are ones in which women’s relative participation exceeds men’s by a very small
margin. With this alteration, we arrive at a distribution in which 12 classes are dominated
by men, 6 by women, and 5 are essentially even. As noted in the report, imbalances in fa-
vor of men tend to exceed those in favor of women.
- Id.
- Id., 97.
- Id. Of the 6 classes in which female students clearly dominated, only 1 was taught
by a female professor. (Women dominated in 5 of the 18 classes taught by male professors
and 1 of the 5 classes taught by female professors. Male students dominated in 2 of the
remaining classes taught by women, and participation was roughly even in the other 2
female-taught classes. This leaves a distribution in which 2 of 5 classes taught by women
and 3 of 18 classes taught by men had roughly even participation in terms of gender.) The
report commendably called for further research, pointing to areas that need further ex-
amination based on this initial investigation.
- Id., 37. Monitors kept track of whether classes were “strict Socratic,” which was
defined as involving no notice to students who were called on; Socratic method with “on-
call” notice to participants in advance; volunteers called on when hands were raised; and
“free-form discussion, no one is called on.” Id., 98.
- Neufeld, “Costs of an Outdated Pedagogy?,” 522. As noted earlier, the students
also conducted a set of surveys and collected data on grade and honors distributions by
gender. In addition, they collected information on extracurricular activities, use of avail-
able mental health care, and employment, as well as conducting eight single-sex focus
groups to aid in formulating and supplementing the survey results.
Notes to Page 189 265
