Social Challenges Facing Women as Educators and Mothers

ABSTRACT This article addresses the interplay between motherhood and working as a professional educator. It focuses on female educators’ relationships in the public sphere and private sphere, and how these two spheres inform and impact one another. The research aims to establish the degree and extent to which societal dictates affect women’s identities in each of these roles (mother and educator), and how these women, in turn, affect society and challenge traditional perceptions in the private (home) and public spheres. The study employed qualitative methodology; semi-structured interviews were conducted with 22 female early childhood educators. The findings reveal the interviewees’ desire to take part in the broader public sphere and apply their professional skills beyond the confines of the workplace, for example, by counseling parents on issues that have only an indirect connection with the educational framework. The educators need to establish their professional status, which at times conflicts with their role as mothers; at the same time, they utilize their mothering skills with young pupils and disadvantaged mothers in ways that may go beyond the boundaries of their professional role.