KWDI Korean Women’s Development Institute

The purpose of the study is to examine the barriers and promotional elements that affect gender equality in universities and graduate schools. The study was conducted as the third year project of a series of research projects on gender equality which had formerly dealt with the domains of housework and workplace. In the study, a survey was conducted on how gender separation in various activities in a university campus, including undergraduate and graduate school classes, laboratories and interpersonal relationships among students, and practices of gender equality in role division processes in classes, student clubs, the future workplace and future household labor, differ according to universitylevel variables (year, major, undergraduate/graduate school, coed/single-sex college, percentage of female students, percentage of female professors, degree of gender equality in campus culture, etc.) and personal-level variables (family upbringing, gender role attitudes, gender identity, ambivalent sexism, etc.). A questionnaire survey was conducted on 5,021 undergraduate students (2,248 male and 2,778 female students) and 534 graduate school students (254 male and 280 female students) while focus group interviewing (FGI) was conducted on groups of professors, undergraduate and graduate school students. The results showed numerous variations based on university-level and personal-level variables. First, when male and female students were compared in classes, club activities and participation in department events female students appeared to have more active participation only in activities stereotypically considered as being in the female domain, such as preparation of food, beverages or refreshments in department events, and in most other activities, male students participated more actively than female students. Second, while the difference in participation of male and female students was quite considerable in classes, interpersonal relationships and participation in academic and extracurricular activities, the difference of male and female participation in less important and accessorial activities was low, consistently showing gender separation. This gender separation also appeared similarly in activities carried out in graduate schools. However, in a campus culture with a high degree of gender equality and in academic areas with a high percentage of female students, gender separation of participation appeared to decrease. Third, in scenario tasks where subjects were made to assign roles in classes, student clubs, departmental activities and the future workplace, stereotypical gender role division appeared consistently, with dominant and central roles being assigned to men and less important and accessorial roles being assigned to women. In contrast, in tasks that examined the willingness to participate in household chores in the future, female students were more willing to participate in most daily, repetitive household chores, whereas male students appeared to be more willing to participate in non-daily, accessorial household activities.

Stereotypical separation of gender roles in universities, workplace and household activities appeared to decrease according to gender equality in campus culture and upbringing as well as the gender egalitarianism of each individual, but the influence was not significant enough to restructure the dual structure of gender role separation. Likewise, the assignment of roles based on stereotypical separation of gender roles prevails firmly not only in class and extracurricular activities, but also future workplace and household activities, indicating that it affects the quality of life for women in various patterns.

The results of the study suggest that numerous policy measures need to be applied to reorganize the gender structure in our society and campus life in a more equal way and to facilitate improvement. In this aspect, the study discussed possible measures including ‘development of a standard modules for subjects related to women and gender equality in universities’, ‘strengthened support for mentoring and human network for career development of female students’, 'introduction of the obligation of gender equality education for new professors and students,' and 'introduction of a gender equality improvement index in evaluation and financial support for universities.'