Qualified Women Shun Teaching Profession.

During the 1980s the teaching profession suffered as many qualified women entered other fields formerly closed to them. Women who in prior decades might have become teachers deserted the field for business, medicine, and law. The other professions' gain was education's loss, said Carol Gilligan, a prominent feminist researcher in women's development at Harvard University. According to Gilligan's research, women respond more readily to people than to principle; they are guided not so much by broad perceptions of right and wrong as by the moral logic of care. It is impossible, she said, for most women to consider an action or moral dilemma without considering its effects on the people involved. Therefore, women have special gifts for teaching, and she and others expressed concern that teaching may become a "nesting ground for those who can't do anything...