women now make up less than half of the students in Iran’s universities, suggesting the government has changed the enrollment system to shut many women out.
For several years, official figures have shown women making up well more than 60 percent of the university enrollment in Iran.
Many conservatives have complained about that, suggesting that higher education was wasted on women or that the high proportion of women was pushing males who needed a university education for their careers out onto the streets. Others said all those degrees would hurt the marriage prospects of women or undermine Iran’s “traditional values.”
There has been much talk for years about putting quotas on female students or otherwise imposing restrictions to reduce their numbers. But no restrictions of any kind have ever been announced.
Then, last week, the head of the Research and Planning Organization of Higher Studies, Masud Hadian Dehkordi, announced that the university student body this year totals 3,790,859 with 50.5 percent of them male and 49.5 percent female—the first time in decades that the proportion of women was that low.
Dehkordi gave no explanation for the sudden and dramatic drop. He announced no restrictions on female enrolments in universities.
Shadi Sadr, a women’s rights activist, told Radio Farda the new numbers meant there had to be quotas.
Most of the public talk by conservatives has spoken of the need for quotas mainly in fields that conservatives consider masculine, like engineering and medicine.
One problem is that a quota on women in medicine would tie the regime in ideological knots. Several years ago, the government decided that male doctors should not treat women. A goal of a health care system divided by gender was announced.
But to train enough women so that female Iranians are only treated by female physicians would require that medical schools enroll more women than men for several years.
So, if there is now a quota on female medical students for ideological reasons, then the ideological goal of a gender-segregated health care system will not be possible.
