Hegemony and Assessment: The student experience of being in a male homogenous higher education computing course

Abstract

This work emanates from a previous study examining the experiences of male final year students in computing degree programmes that focused on their perceptions as students where they had few, if any, female classmates. This empirical work consisted of focus groups, with the findings outlined here drawn from two groups that were homogeneous with respect to gender. It identified that the masculinisation of computing and the resulting hegemonic masculinity has far-reaching impact. An unanticipated theme was how this homogeneity impacted their course assessments. Students participating in this research identified discomfort with their experience of the institutional hegemonic masculinity. Further work to understand how this hegemonic masculinity impacts teachers is also proposed.