Depends what the screening process is for. If you think, as I do, that it's for working out which people will make the best doctors, over their careers, then it seems rational to take into account anything you need to get that result. In practice, I think it can't be done without falling foul of sex-discrimination legislation, and that's probably a good thing overall, but I think this is a case of allowing some bad judgements to be made for the greater good. If you doubt that this is a bad judgement, imagine an extreme case: imagine that 99% of 18yo women "interviewed" mature enough to be doctors, and 99% of 18yo men didn't, but that there was evidence that there was no significant difference between 25yo men and women in that respect. Would you think it reasonable to recruit only women, because of how they interviewed at 18? I would conclude that the interview procedure was somehow flawed!
Better childcare: yes, it's very important. However, I doubt that it actually has much to do with why so many women doctors work part-time. These people are very well-paid: well enough paid that they can buy whatever childcare they want, now. The ones I know who work part time do so because they can: they can earn enough money to be comfortable in less than a full-time job. So they choose to do that, because they prefer it. (And so would I, but my job isn't that well paid, so I work full time. Double my salary, and I'd go part time too.) Improving the provision of childcare wouldn't make any difference at all to that. Altering society so that men and women are equally likely to want to work part-time if they can afford to do so would make more male GPs work part-time too, but that's another matter. And neither of these things (providing more childcare, and changing society) is going to happen fast enough that it makes any sense for anyone to wait for it, instead of planning for what's happening now.
NB I am NOT saying that we should take a male student who's likely to be a less good doctor than a female student because he's less likely to work part-time! That would be discrimination.
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Date: 2008-04-04 11:06 am (UTC)Better childcare: yes, it's very important. However, I doubt that it actually has much to do with why so many women doctors work part-time. These people are very well-paid: well enough paid that they can buy whatever childcare they want, now. The ones I know who work part time do so because they can: they can earn enough money to be comfortable in less than a full-time job. So they choose to do that, because they prefer it. (And so would I, but my job isn't that well paid, so I work full time. Double my salary, and I'd go part time too.) Improving the provision of childcare wouldn't make any difference at all to that. Altering society so that men and women are equally likely to want to work part-time if they can afford to do so would make more male GPs work part-time too, but that's another matter. And neither of these things (providing more childcare, and changing society) is going to happen fast enough that it makes any sense for anyone to wait for it, instead of planning for what's happening now.
NB I am NOT saying that we should take a male student who's likely to be a less good doctor than a female student because he's less likely to work part-time! That would be discrimination.