JOURNAL OF EDUCATION
Year:2006 | Volume:22 | Issue:3 (87)|Papers Count:7

One of the most important goals of all educational systems is to help with the development of today's girls and tomorrow's women.Epistemologists with feminist perspectives believe that women as a group have different experiences than men with their own special characteristics; as a result, men cannot be a point of reference for women or judge them correctly. The problem with such one-sided perspectives is that they ignore many other dimensions and experiences of other groups of women and girls. As a result, while bring about different attitudes and special criteria, such perspectives take the attention away from the general concerns of women and girls in a specific or different cultures. The emphasis has gradually shifted from woman to gender, and in recent years, to group. Many issues related to girls and women development demand newer perspectives in research. The role of education in the 21st century is, along side providing equal opportunities in all aspects of life including decision making, policy, and management, for men and women, create the appropriate conditions for research in order to portray the true image of today's girls and tomorrow's order to portray the true image of today's girls and tomorrow's women in the society.

New theoretical perspectives developed during the recent years in social sciences, by emphasizing new concepts, have brought about changes within the conventional science. The gender equality approach has been around for the past three decades emphasizing the difference between sex and gender has criticized the gender stereotypes and the lack of serious attention, on the part of researchers, towards the issues of women. The main goal in this approach is to see women's position within the social structure as a special one and pay attention to their different experiences. This paper is on the efforts undertaken in identifying the areas of inequality in order to eliminate causes of discrimination.Gender inequality is among the very important issues is Iranian educational system. Some efforts in eliminating discrimination have been observed. Social research is a good way of identifying educational problems and ways of solving them. Although some studies in this area conducted, it seems that due to the socio-cultural aspects of the research centers, they are mostly concerned with the sex differences, rather than the gender equality issues.

This article, using Sara Lange's theoretical-analytical model of "Empowering Women," analyzes the educational status of Iranian girls and women. In this model, the process of equalizing and empowering women consists of five stages: providing welfare, facilitating access, increasing awareness, allowing participation, and putting in control (achieving power).The passage from each of these stages to the next is indicative of decrease in inequality and increase in women's power. Analyzing gender inequalities in Iranian educational system with regard to these five stages, the reverse relation between the extent of achieving power and the progress made through the stages becomes clear. As we move on from the earlier stages of providing welfare and increasing access, the extent of empowerment decreases to the point that at the .stage five, putting women in positions of decision making, planning and policy making, the steps taken are insignificant.

Textbooks mirror the ideological, cultural, political, religious, and... Policies of the society. One of the basic roles of the educational systems in any country is to infuse the national identity to the educational process. In doing so, the textbooks play an instrumental role in bringing about and strengthening group, gender, and ethnic identities. In this paper, the Geography and History, and Social Studies textbooks used in elementary and guidance schools, 8 books in total, are reviewed. Results show that only in Social Studies textbook for the first year of the guidance school, a telatively balances view of the gender identity development is presented. In the textbooks for the second and third year students, the girls' is less outstanding.

Using the gender equality approach in important steps toward the actualization of the "Education for All Program." In order to identify the way in which women are portrayed in elementary school textbooks. 32 volumes of these books were content analyzed in terms of pictures, names, family status, activities, and personalities associated with women. The findings show that the portrayal of women and girls is less frequent than that of men and boys. Mothers always play the marginal roles in the family; women have no professional! occupational identity and are not portrayed independently; as girls' portrayals in the sprots arenas are very limited in number and that of women in the scientific, political, and historical domains are rare. Changing the image of women in the textbooks requires a conceptual framework within which men and women are valued as equals who have the same cognitive and social abilities and therefore must have equal educational opportunities. In this framework, the personal, familial, and social status of woman alongside of that of every member of the family is emphasized.

The educational institutions in any country are responsible for creation of equal educational opportunities and facilities for all members of the society regardless of gender, race, class, or ethnicity. The existing gender gaps in access and benefiting from education are indicative of the fact that many suffer from the inequality in access to and use of educational facilities and resources. A gender-sensitive educational system can guaranty boys and girls' access to education and full participation in the country's development. This paper, while identifying the characteristics of a gender-sensitive educational system, analysis a part of the educational planning process for the public school using a gender approach. Results show that not only the process of planning, goals, and priorities lack any clear indication of achieving gender equality or eliminating inequalities, but is some instances gender stereotypes persist.Due to the insufficiency of the gender indices, the planning process has failed to identify the gender gap in benefiting from education.