Family-friendly university: An overview of simultaneous motherhood & education experience

Dabbaghi, Hamideh; Zarean, Zahra

doi:10.22035/jous.2024.5489.1099

Family-friendly university: An overview of simultaneous motherhood & education experience

Document Type : Original Research Paper

Authors

Hamideh Dabbaghi ¹

Zahra Zarean ²

¹ Assistant Professor, Women’s Studies Department. Faculty of Social Sciences, Allameh Tabataba’i University, Tehran, Iran

² MA in Women’s Studies, Faculty of Social Sciences, Allameh Tabataba’i University, Tehran, Iran

10.22035/jous.2024.5489.1099

Abstract

The lived experience of mother-students in family-friendly universities is a multi-layered and complex issue. This article, based on a conceptual framework grounded in the concepts of motherhood, role conflict and strain, and family-friendliness, aims to answer two key questions: What characteristics and indicators define a family-friendly university in the experience of countries at the forefront of this idea? And what is the relationship between family-friendliness and the experiences of mother-students in university practice? This study uses a qualitative approach and is based on semi-structured interviews with 19 mother-students. The data were analyzed through thematic coding and analysis. The findings highlight one main theme centered around the "relationship between the university and family-friendliness," with two sub-themes and six concepts. Some of the indicators in the family-friendly university policies are focused on women, while others focus on the family and some on broader gender-related concepts. Measures such as maternity leave, breastfeeding rooms, and pregnancy support are primarily designed based on the assumption of women’s caregiving roles, often referring to women and their gender roles rather than family or gender in a broader sense. Some of the existing indicators and measures in family-friendly universities belong to a broader discourse on gender and gender justice, such as the design of flexible educational programs for parents or facilitating men’s involvement in caregiving roles. However, the support provided by universities is often inadequate, scattered, and inconsistent, with little attention paid to the family structure or a broader gender perspective. The research findings indicate that the support universities offer in line with family-friendly policies is mainly focused on mother-students, but these supports are often insufficient, fragmented, and inconsistent. Most measures are limited to facilitating the role of motherhood and give little attention to the family structure or a broader gender perspective. For example, maternity leave is the main support provided in universities, but its implementation is not uniform. Distance learning and virtual education are still offered in a limited and informal way, and curriculum planning does not provide sufficient flexibility to accommodate the conditions of mother-students.

Keywords

Family-Friendly University

Higher Education Policy

Women

Subjects

Women and University in Iran

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