Gendered Experiences of Non-traditional Students in Irish Higher Education

Abstract

This chapter focuses on how gender is situated as part of enduring and deeply embedded inequalities in student access and participation to higher education (HE). This acknowledges how gender is shaped by the wider ‘social expectations women and men are subject to, institutional practices and culture which often reinforce persistent gendered inequalities and the commitment of institutional and national bodies towards the pursuit of gender equality’ (Loots and Walker 2015, p. 372). How gender intersects with other areas of inequalities, such as class, ethnicity, age and disability, is core to this analysis. This is explored in terms of the relationship between policy aspirations, implementation and lived experiences of education.

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Introduction

This chapter focuses on how gender is situated as part of enduring and deeply embedded inequalities in student access and participation to higher education (HE). This acknowledges how gender is shaped by the wider ‘social expectations women and men are subject to, institutional practices and culture which often reinforce persistent gendered inequalities and the commitment of institutional and national bodies towards the pursuit of gender equality’ (Loots and Walker 2015, p. 372). How gender intersects with other areas of inequalities, such as class, ethnicity, age and disability, is core to this analysis. This is explored in terms of the relationship between policy aspirations, implementation and lived experiences of education. At the heart of this analysis lies a concern with the experiences of non-traditional learners as they engage with the culture and structures of HE.

Discourses of performativity, accountability, professionalism, employability and individualism have shaped the contours of Irish HE in recent decades within a neo-liberal drive towards greater efficiency (Lynch et al. 2012). How this is experienced by students in terms of access, identity and widening participation is vital. Non-traditional students struggle to fit ever-narrowing categories of learner and ways of measuring learning and participation. Learners are being positioned as clients developing their employability skills, while the learning processes and curricula remain dominated by logical mathematical reasoning and modes of expression. Knowledge is structured within academic hierarchies, which are governed by pedagogies of expertise, and the hierarchies of assessment and accreditation. This has powerful consequences in terms of stratification and reproduction at a societal level (Bourdieu and Passeron 1990). Within neo-liberalism, education is increasingly coalescing within a knowledge economy discourse which privileges certain disciplines as vital to the economic wellbeing of the nation, primarily the science, technology, engineering and mathematical (STEM) subjects. This re-channelling of education’s purpose has occurred concurrent to the massification of HE, creating contradictory flows of expansion and stratification in HE. Democratic and social justice values interweave with market-driven economic discourses.

Much of the evidence for these gendered experiences originates from national statistical analyses that track key trends in Irish HE. This chapter critically examines the measurement capacity of such quantitative analysis, which is often embedded in positivist frameworks linked to performative demands. The individual unit basis of measurements often disguises the complex intersectional nature of how inequalities are experienced by those participating in the education system. How this becomes known through quantifiable indicators, measurement tools and formal access initiatives is a vital part of this story. How we come to know the lived experiences of students as they engage with the culture and structures of HE needs to be at the heart of our thinking. HE is experienced very differently by female and male students, not only in terms of learning experiences but also through a complex intersection of power, recognition and resources (Archer et al. 2003; Leathwood and Read 2009; Baker et al. 2009).

The Higher Education Student as Independent Rational-Critical Agent

How we think of the HE student is deeply rooted in traditional notions of learning and the individual in Western philosophy. This tends to be an image of the individual learner as an autonomous subject independent of other family, work and social commitments, who draws on logical mathematical reasoning and modes of expression (Lynch and Ivancheva 2015). These historical roots of the academic learner identity have renewed resonance through ‘the independent and self-reliant individual of neo-liberalism – the new choice-making subject who is required to continually “invest” in their own up-skilling to compete in the flexible labour market’ (Leathwood and Read 2009, p. 97). This merging of traditional academic constructs of the HE student with the drive of the neo-liberal knowledge economy creates powerful imperatives for contemporary learners. This has particular significance for non-traditional learners who do not fit these characteristics easily. It is contextualised in this chapter in terms of the differing experiences of HE by female and male students.

Where the Lens Focuses: Policy and Research Attention on Gender in Higher Education

Policy attention has focused on particular gendered implications of access and widening participation in HE. As Ball remind us, ‘Policies rarely tell you exactly what to do, they rarely dictate or determine practice, but some more than others narrow the range of creative responses’ (2012, p. 3). General patterns of access to HE continue to be highlighted nationally, with OECD and HEA data revealing that more young women than ever are participating in HE as part of the massification of HE. This occurred within the broader landscape of Irish policy, which has shifted in the past few decades from the explicit interest in gender equality evident in the 1990s to the current narrowing of discursive possibilities. The Green Paper (DES 1992) and the Report on the National Education Convention (Coolahan 1994) highlighted gender equality as a fundamental issue. The White Paper (DES 1995a) followed suit by actively requiring all HE institutions to develop policies on gender equality and assigned responsibility to the HEA to monitor and support this (1995, p. 109). This was part of a ‘wider commitment to…[the] principle of equality [a]s a cornerstone of national educational policy’ (1995a, p. 207) being implemented in the equality and educational legislation of this time and though initiatives such as the Gender Equality Unit (which monitored and commissioned research on gender equality in the then Department of Education and Science).

This level of activity fell away from early 2000s onwards, with the Report of the Action Group on Access to Higher Education (DES 2001) on access to HE making no mention of gender equality. The National Plan for Equity of Access to Higher Education 2008–2013 report acknowledged that a ‘significant and growing gender gap [in favour of females] has emerged over recent years’ in Irish HE, which while moderate by international levels was of growing concern (HEA 2008a, p. 37). This was framed primarily in terms of addressing male disadvantage, identifying ‘key challenges includ[ing] the…strengthening of the interface with further education and the expansion of opportunities to combine work and study’ (2008a, p. 38). This marked a significant reframing of policy responses to gender equality in terms of male participation and the linking of gender equality in HE with further education, work and study. The most recent National Plan for Equity of Access to Higher Education 2015–2019 (HEA 2015e) report notes gender as a longstanding national policy priority of achieving equity of access to HE, with no other active engagement. Through these most recent reports, we see a noticeable policy shift from the explicit concern and policy implementation of gender equality in the 1990s to the current limited policy focus on particular aspects of gender equality if at all.

Irish HE follows international trends where more females are participating in HE (OECD 2015c); 87,785 females as compared to 85,439 males in 2015 (HEA 2016c). This varies by sector, with colleges (of education mainly) and universities enrolling more females while the IoTs continue to enrol more males (HEA 2016c). These participation patterns belie a more complex picture. International studies such as PISA (2012) and OECD (2015c) highlight the ‘double disadvantage of having too many boys who drop out of school or leave school with low skills and/or skills that are not well matched with labour market requirements’ (OECD 2015c, p. 21). This is allied with diverse gendered representation in different disciplines, with females ‘under-represented in the fields of mathematics, physical science and computing, but dominate the fields of biology, medicine, agriculture and humanities’ (OECD 2015c, p. 19). Expectations are also different, as PISA (2012) ‘reveals that boys and girls hold different expectations for their futures and that they tend to prepare themselves for life after compulsory education in very different ways’ (OECD 2015c, p. 4). Girls are more likely to focus on subject interests and a combination of personal, social and family reasons, while boys cite financial and employment reasons (Archer et al. 2003, p. 123).

As a consequence of these trends, policy and research attention has continued to focus on the broad patterns of gender statistics. Less attention has been paid to how these trends have been constructed through the technologies of measurement. Gender is defined in a binary discourse in terms of male and female, with the recognition of gender diversity evident through the campaigning and 2015 gender recognition bill not yet apparent in research (GLEN 2016; TENI 2015). While the language of this chapter adopts this wider recognition of gender diversity, the lack of research data attuned to gender diversity means that the focus remains primarily on the gendered experiences of males and females in the HE, with other gendered stories yet to be told. This technology of measurement focuses on how individuals access and navigate the education system. The stories of these learners and groups are solidified as singular units or entities, defined in terms of how they might fit within the existing system, rather than any consideration of the diverse intersectionality in people’s lives. The onus is on individual learner(s), with measurement units focusing on access, progression and output. Noticeably, there is little capacity to focus on the background context of learners or the institutional context of learning, which we know is vitally important for widening participation. Consequently:

WP policy is embedded in regulatory practices, which aim to ‘fix’ or ‘correct’ the WP subject, so that s/he will fit in to the hegemonic expectations of what it means to be a university student. The fixing or correcting is based on an (imaginary) ideal student-subject, associated with normalised values and dispositions, historically connected with the young, able-bodied, middle-classed, white racialised subject. (Burke 2011, p. 171)

This has profound implications for non-traditional learners who do not easily fit the measureable criteria of these regulatory practices. It is gendered with income classifications, for example, being premised on gendered assumptions about male labour, assumptions about homogeneity within socio-economic groups and the labour market itself as well as a wide array of socio-cultural norms about gender (Archer et al. 2003, p. 11)

As Burke notes, this ‘fail[s] to take account of deeply embedded and complex histories of exclusion, inequality and misrecognition’ of non-traditional students in HE (2011, p. 173). Identities are always in process, material and discursive, subjectively experienced and constantly shifting within their specific socio-cultural and temporal contexts (Archer et al. 2003, pp. 13–14). The effects of this individualised orientation are further exacerbated in a neo-liberal economy based on individual employability in a global marketplace. Individuals are expected to self-regulate and manage their learning to ensure that their skills match the changing needs of a precarious, flexible and competitive employment market. This approach promotes certain disciplines in HE (primarily STEM subjects), learning outcomes (clearly defined subject and generic skills, which are measureable and incremental in nature) and learning skills (flexible, independent and critical learning skills, which are performance-related and deemed as useful for employability). These discourses interrupt the apparent meritocracy of the HE system, undermining the policy intentions of equal access and participation for all learners.

Gendered Patterns in Irish Higher Education

The shift towards system massification, which began in the mid-1980s, had important gender dimensions that continue to feature. While this expansion is often cited as part of the Irish success story which led to relatively equal numbers of females and males now attending HE (Clancy and Wall 2000; O’Connell et al. 2006; HEA 2016c), it belies a more complex gendered picture. Females are more likely to participate at certain levels and disciplines and are more likely than male students to progress through and graduate from HE (HEA 2016b). This expansion mainly concerned specific sectors of the Irish population, primarily learners accessing undergraduate programmes directly from school through the Central Applications Office (CAO) system. These learners are stratified according to the points that they achieve in the Leaving Certificate with access to high demand (mainly professional) courses restricted to those who achieve high academic results.

Institutional stratification within the HE system is also significant, with universities, colleges and IoTs not only providing different types and levels of programmes, but also types of learning experiences, which attract diverse students. For example, Irish colleges (71 per cent) and universities (53 per cent) enrol more females, while the IoTs continue to enrol more males (57 per cent), reflecting different cultures and subject offerings (HEA 2016b). Skeggs (1997) notes how the discourses of academia and vocationalism are themselves gendered. Academic knowledge has been ascribed a higher status in elite institutions and is associated with the rational logical and mathematical knowledges, which were perceived as masculine (Leathwood and Read 2009). Vocational knowledge has been traditionally given a lower recognition in educational systems, as well as being gendered within its own offerings, with industry and apprenticeships programmes associated with male students (such as construction services and engineering), while vocational education for female students has centred on the lower paid and precarious service industries, such as hairdressing, beautician and childcare (Grummell and Murray 2015) (Table 9.1).

Table 9.1 Gender of all full-time enrolments in HEA-funded institutions, 2015 (HEA 2016c)

Patterns of subject choice are also gendered, with science, technology, engineering and mathematical subjects dominated by male students, while females make up the majority in education, humanities and arts, social sciences, business, law and services (HEA 2016c). The clustering of women in arts and humanities while men dominate STEM subjects echoes social and economic hegemonic norms (giving these disciplines higher recognition, remuneration and career progression opportunities). This gendered stratification of different types of knowledge represents ‘subjects such as physics, chemistry and mathematics…as highly academic, difficult and masculine. These “hard” subjects are contrasted with the “soft”, presumed easier, arts and humanities that tend to be coded as feminine’ (Leathwood 2013, p. 135). This must be positioned within the wider socio-cultural expectations of hegemonic femininities and masculinities, which frame subject choices.

There is also a gender difference evident in the level of programme, with greater female representation in undergraduate diplomas, honours degrees, postgraduate certificates and diplomas but marginally lower female representation in the higher-level postgraduate masters and Ph.D.programmes (HEA 2016c) and likewise in terms of lower levels of females at the professorial and higher rankings of academic staff (Lynch et al. 2012). These trends are reflected in graduation levels, with 54 per cent of all HE awards being conferred to females in 2013. This is described as the ‘female advantage’, particularly in relation to undergraduate diploma awards (62 per cent female), honours degrees (56 per cent female), postgraduate diplomas and certificates (63 per cent and 68 per cent female, respectively) and taught masters (55 per cent female). The counter-discourse of male disadvantage is also evident in the literature and policy documents, especially at school level. These binary discourses of female/male dis/advantage need to be challenged and problematised as they gloss over very complex stratification patterns and set in train highly problematic deficit-based modes of intervention.

Intersections of Gender and Other Equalities in Irish Higher Education

Research points to the importance of developing more nuanced analyses, which recognise the complex nature of stratification across class, gender and ethnic identities (Savage et al. 1992; Reay et al. 2001; Francis et al. 2014). Loots and Walker (2015, p. 370) argue for ‘cognisance of intersectional influences on students’ gendered HE experiences [as]…a vital consideration in policy goals and implementation strategies.’ Such cognisance is clearly relevant for ambiguous experiences of students from working class backgrounds in HE where many speak of the difficulties that they have in adapting to the learning culture and structures of HE (Fleming et al. 2010; Merrill et al. 2010). Socio-economic diversity continues to be a concern in Irish education, with national statistics revealing persistent class-based inequalities in access and participation throughout the expansion of HE (Clancy 1988; Clancy and Wall 2000; McCoy and Smyth 2011).

The growing number of mature students who have entered the HE sector in recent decades reveals one such intersection with important gender implications. Many of these are female, most of whom have families and primary care responsibilities. Many speak of how their family circumstances influenced their educational participation with many leaving work to care for their children and later choosing to return to education when their children are older as a long-held ambition. The influence of discourses of hegemonic femininities and care commitments are important to consider in terms of experiences of these students (Skeggs 1997; Lynch et al. 2009). The context and culture of HE institutions are important with mature students as they are more likely to progress to the second year of their programmes in IoTs as compared to universities (HEA 2016c). As compared with 28.7 per cent of male undergraduates, 35.9 per cent of all female undergraduates study part-time (ECU 2008 cited in Burke 2011, p. 174). Gendered patterns of part-time versus full-time registration of students have important implications for women. Part-time registration entails significant fees and often excludes students from fees exemptions, tax rebates and grants. By virtue of this, women from lower socio-economic and from ethnic minority backgrounds in particular are often under-represented.

New types of students have entered Irish HE in recent years – notably through initiatives for students with disabilities, socio-economic disadvantage and mature students, but also students from diverse ethnic backgrounds. Data are only emerging now about students from an ethnic minority background, but this issue warrants further investigation in terms of its implications for widening access and participation. Participation rates for students from Traveller background remain consistently low, reflecting the dismal track record of inclusion of Travellers in Irish society. As Pavee Point and Irish Travellers Movement have highlighted, inclusion targets are based on individual student access rather than a deeper appreciation of Travellers’ culture. For example, many Travellers are married and living independently before the age of 23 years, which means they are not eligible for Student Universal Support Ireland (SUSI) grants. For female Travellers, family commitments and cultural norms may preclude or discourage them from participation in HE, indicating the intersection of ethnicity and gendered factors.

With regard to other equality issues, existing diversities has become more visible on a public stage. Greater recognition of sexual identities is evident through the general cultural shift in Irish society (Inglis 1998). Specifically the concerted efforts of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer, Questioning and Intersex (LGBTQI) movement and Marriage Equality referendum (2015) have achieved greater visibility and rights across all areas of Irish society (GLEN 2016). LGBTQI societies in HE have been very vocal in these campaigns. However, this is not necessarily reflected in the curricula or pedagogical approaches of HE. Approaches still tend to be framed in terms of specific initiatives to address homophobia primarily aimed at and developing from the school sectors. In HE, sexualities are most clearly visibly in the development of specialised research areas and programmes (such as women’s studies, masculinities, LGBT and queer studies) rather than being part of the normative culture of HE.

Access Initiatives in Higher Education: Gender in the DARE Initiative

Government response to these inequalities in access and participation has been to establish formal initiatives to incentivise individual access routes for diverse groups to HE. The remainder of this chapter explores one such initiative in order to explore the gendered dynamics for widening access and participation. The Disability Access Route to Education (DARE) scheme was established to increase the numbers of students with disabilities progressing from second level to HE by reserving a number of places for DARE-eligible students on reduced CAO points.¹ The following analysis explores national applications and acceptance rates through the DARE scheme in 2010 and 2011.² This gives important insights into the intersection of gender with disability issues in understanding access and participation to HE. While this research does not fully represent the diversity of gender and disability backgrounds among students, it does provide an opportunity to provide a quantitative snapshot of the non-traditional students who applied and accept a place on HE courses through the DARE initiative in these years. It reveals important insights into the modes of intervention of how access initiatives operate and their gendered implications, as explored next.

DARE operates through the designation of categories of disability eligible for consideration under the scheme.³ Disability Advisory Boards devised quantifiable indicators which are mapped to the academic impact of each disability on Leaving Certificate examination performance. Critically examining how and why these criteria are selected reveal the ‘problematic nature of judging who has potential, and who does not, [which] is silenced in the policy discourse’ (Burke 2011, pp. 170–171). In this case, it creates an access system premised on academic learning impacts⁴ that are selected by qualified professionals (rather than wider learning, environmental or social criteria that literature and research demonstrates are key for learning, especially for learners with disabilities already disadvantaged by an academic system). This leaves the power balance and decision-making in the narrow realm of the professional field associated with disability and education, rather than the wider experiential, social and affective knowledge of those living with disabilities. In most cases, a medically-reported diagnosis of a specific disability guarantees eligibility highlighting the privileging of medical-based definitions of disability. Byrne et al.’s research highlights ‘strong concerns that the application process may be biased in favour of those with greater financial resources at their disposal to access medical or psychological reports’ (Byrne et al. 2014, p. 114) which is also echoed in recent reports by Rose et al. (2015) and Banks et al. (2015).

The establishment of these criteria can be set within the wider context of research and policy debate over the technologies of measurement being used. Measurement tends to be based on quantifiable units distilled from complex bio-medical-social experiences of disability. How this process of identifying and using such indicators shapes the lived experiences of disability and learning often remains invisible. As Loots and Walker (2015) note:

tracking numerical parity does not address the deeper seated inequalities associated with gender…The pursuit of equality is therefore measured through equal representation, without considering the daily lived experiences of individuals affected by policy goals and ignoring the proposed social justice outcomes of policies. (Loots and Walker 2015, p. 363)

Hence, this chapter seeks to reveal some of the complexity which lies behind these statistics, both in terms of why these measurement technologies are being used and how they are implemented through policy and practice. The following section outlines the application process and general profile of DARE applicants in 2010–11, before exploring what becomes known and knowable in this data about the intersection of gender and disability.

Intersections of Gender and Disability in the DARE Application Process 2010–11

Applicants to the DARE scheme provide general demographic and education information required by the CAO. They submit additional documentation to provide formal evidence of their disability, as well as extensive supporting evidence from medical and social professionals, schools and personal statements. This places considerable demands on the applicant, their family and school support network. This relates not only the power of this measurement technology to shape what become knowable about these applicants, but also is acknowledged as a key constraint to accessing such schemes (Byrne et al. 2013). The onus remains on the individual applicant and their families/communities to fit their experiences into the framework of indicators being used, rather than the system being truly inclusive and able to account equally for the diversity for all applicants to HE. Byrne et al.’s (2013) review of DARE and HEAR access initiatives noted institutional variations in terms of student intake, recruitment, implementation, subject choice and supports for DARE.

The DARE application process provides information on the primary and/or other disability stated by the applicant, medical or supporting information provided by the applicant, the supports confirmed by the applicant as received at second level and requested at HE, student’s personal statement outlining the impact of disability, and overall outcome or eligibility status under the DARE scheme. In the case of the data in Tables 9.2 and 9.3, patterns of gender, disability and school types among successful and ineligible applicants to DARE in 2010 and 2011 are clear. Data provided by the University of Limerick (which managed the data for the participating institutions during this period) show a significant increase in applications to the DARE scheme during this time (see Table 9.2)

Table 9.2 DARE applications summary, 2010–2011 (%)

Table 9.3 Gender of DARE applicants 2010 and 2011

A general review of the data reveals a continual increase in the number of applicants from 2,160 people in 2010 to 2,531 applicants in 2011. Eligible applications for this period increased from 43 per cent (933 applications) in 2010 to 50 per cent (1,272 applicants) in 2011. Acceptances by DARE-eligible applicants in HE significantly increased (by 753) in that two-year period. Of continuing concern though are the high numbers of ineligible applications (880 applications in 2010 and 875 in 2011) and the numbers who do not enter HEIs due to ineligibility despite the extensive work which went into the application process (563 people in 2010 and 523 people in 2011). Male applicants outnumber female applicants in both years, but as Byrne et al. (2013, p. 116) note female applicants are more likely to submit completed applications – all features that warrant further investigation. There was a small percentage increase of female applicants in 2011, as illustrated in Table 9.3.

Of these, the majority of applicants were in the 18–19 years group (55–58 per cent of males were 18–19 years, while 42–45 per cent of females were 18–19 years in 2010 and 2011). A review of gender by disability type for both years reveals that males outnumber females significantly in relation to particular disability categories, notably Asperger’s Syndrome/Autism, Attention Deficit Disorder and Dyspraxia/Developmental Coordination Disorder. Females significantly outnumber males in these years in relation to two disability categories: Mental Health conditions and Significant On-going Illnesses (see Fig. 9.1). The gendered dynamics of these patterns is evident in previous research (Banks et al. 2015), which highlights an association between boys and SEN at school level, as well as links between children with disabilities, poverty and disadvantaged backgrounds. These dynamics highlight vital recognition and resource issues for students who are being disadvantaged in a complex matrix of intersecting aspects, with gendered inflections forming one element.

Fig. 9.1

Disability and gender categorisation of DARE applicants 2010 and 2011

As Fig. 9.2 illustrates, the majority of these applicants attended public second level schools (742 male students and 674 female students in 2010), but with a sizeable percentage attending private fee-paying or revision schools (305 males and 177 females), followed by 192 males and 105 females attending a Delivering Equality of Opportunity in Schools (DEIS)⁵ school and a minority attending special schools.

While the spread between school type is expected (with public schools forming the majority of Irish second levels, sizeable numbers attending DEIS schools, and smaller numbers of private, revision and special schools), the range is significant. Proportionally, there are more applicants from private and revision schools applying to DARE, raising concerns about the socio-economic diversity being achieved. Byrne et al. (2013, pp. 20–21) highlight a similar concern with their study, showing an over-representation of DARE-eligible applicants attending fee-paying second level schools and non-government funded fee-paying schools (‘grind schools’) and an under-representation of those attending DEIS schools (9 per cent compared to 14 per cent of all CAO applicants). These patterns are the reverse of what we might expect, given that existing school data reveal ‘stark differences in SEN prevalence between children from working class backgrounds and their middle class counterparts [with] concentrations of SEN in DEIS schools’ (Banks and McCoy 2011, p. 6). These patterns suggest that the application process is not working for those who are already under-resourced and disadvantaged. Numbers from special schools are very low, which is disappointing given the disability focus of the DARE initiative. Gender is also a feature, with proportionally less females applying to DARE from DEIS, private or special schools. It is only from revision schools where there are more female DARE applicants in 2010 than males, with a high proportion of female students also coming from public school backgrounds (see Fig. 9.2). This reveals significant socio-economic and gendered trends among students who apply to HE through the DARE initiative.

Fig. 9.2

Gender of DARE applicants (n) by school type in 2010

Concluding Discussion

This analysis focuses on how gender is situated as part of the complex of enduring and deeply embedded inequalities in access and participation to HE, especially for non-traditional students. Historically, the expansion of Irish HE has been tightly bound up with Irish economic needs through a human capital approach (Hurley 2014), but more recently within a frame of market-driven capitalism and neoliberal employability. HE policy blends social justice aspirations with a discursive hegemony about the role of HE to inculcate entrepreneurial and individualistic values for the knowledge economy. This has taken shape within a new managerialist system, which structure learners and their experiences in processes of performativity, accreditation and professionalism. This chapter has been concerned with the gendered implications of non-traditional students in HE.

This chapter problematises the quantitative basis of the technology of measuring access and participation by reducing complex life experiences into measureable individual units. While this reveals patterns of gendered engagement and exclusions, it oversimplifies the complex intersectionality of these experiences in the messy realities of learners’ lives. As argued throughout this book, this compartmentalises complex gendered experience of diverse groups and individuals into discrete units as the ‘objects of intervention’. This creates modes of intervention based on how the system measures complex gender experiences as ‘problematic’ rather than an incapacity of the educational system or society to respond to diversity.

The latter part of this chapter analyses empirical evidence about the intersection of gender and disability based on on-going statistical analysis of students accessing HE through the DARE initiative in 2010 and 2011. It reveals key intersections of disability, gender and school type, which require significantly more research. They do point to the importance of critically interrogating the capacity of our current technologies of measurement and accountability to represent and support inclusive diversity. Loots and Walker (2015) call for:

a more comprehensive understanding of gender equality in higher education contexts to inform gender policies, one which expands the freedoms of human beings to choose the lives that are valuable for them as the informational space for evaluating justice. The gender equality we argue for stresses the ability of individuals as active agents of change, guided by the availability of capabilities to challenge social structures and confinements, as well as the interaction between individuals, social structures and institutions. The link between active intervention enabling policy creation and the implementation thereof is therefore a fundamental capability enhancer for empowerment. (Loots and Walker 2015, p. 373).