The Teacher's Forum
Welcome to The Teacher's Forum, hosted by David Harris, a veteran educator with 33 years of experience in private, public, and charter schools.
The Teacher's Forum explores the people, ideas, and issues shaping education and the world around us. Through conversations with educators, authors, researchers, students, and other thought leaders from across the United States and around the globe, we share diverse perspectives, inspiring stories, and practical insights that inform, challenge, and inspire.
Whether you're an educator, a student, or simply someone who loves learning, there's a place for you in the conversation.
Visit theteachersforum.org, follow @theforum1993 on X, connect with David on Threads and Instagram @dwharris1691, or email david@theteachersforum.org with your thoughts, episode ideas, or if you'd like to be a guest on the show.
The Teacher's Forum
Gender and the Education Gap: Dr. Charlotte Jacobs and Dr. Roderick Carey on Boys, Girls, and Student Belonging
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In this thought-provoking episode of The Teacher’s Forum, David Harris is joined by Charlotte Jacobs and Roderick L. Carey to examine the narratives shaping conversations about gender and education. The episode opens with a classroom incident that raises questions about how boys experience discipline, attention, and belonging in schools (01:44), before turning to reactions to the CBS documentary Boys to Men and the media framing of a so-called “boy crisis” (04:05).
The conversation critiques this framing by situating it in historical and social context, including how Black boys have long been viewed as problems to be managed rather than young people to be supported (06:35). Dr. Jacobs challenges zero-sum thinking around resources for girls and boys, emphasizing that equity work for girls addressed centuries of exclusion and remains unfinished (09:25). Dr. Carey reframes the idea of boys being “overlooked,” arguing instead that Black boys are hyper-visible in discipline but emotionally invisible in schools (12:56).
The discussion then explores how boys are navigating a changing cultural landscape, including the pull of the “manosphere” and growing skepticism about traditional college-to-career pathways (15:00). Both guests stress the importance of validating boys’ interior lives (20:30) and moving from a narrow focus on achievement toward self-actualization and well-being (24:45). The episode concludes with a call to reimagine schools as centers of care rather than test-driven institutions (29:05), along with recommended readings that center healing, love, and human flourishing in education (32:45).
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