Male teachers are in short supply for children who desperately need a masculine role model. Emma Pinch reports

THE children in Year 5 at St Elizabeth's, in Litherland, are in a lucky minority. Their teacher, Thomas Cox, is male and their teaching assistant is a man, too.

With soaring numbers of family break-ups, for some of these children these are the only adult males they’ll have regular contact with.

But, despite the demand for men in early years childcare, the proportion of men to women is tiny.

There are no figures available for the number working in nurseries in Merseyside, but, of 1,869 primary school teachers employed across the Liverpool Education Authority area, just 239 are male.

At just 13% it’s slightly lower than the national average of 16%.

A new survey, by the Children’s Workforce Development Council, has revealed just how vital they are in childcare.

It found that 55% of parents, and 66% of single parents, want a male childcare worker for their nursery-aged child, yet the reality is that only 2% of childcare workers are men, and it’s a similar story for children when they move on to primary school.

The nursery childcare survey, carried out by the Children’s Workforce Development Council (CWDC), found that parents want men to work in nurseries with the under-fives so the youngsters have access to male role models.

Contact with male role models is a vital part of growing up, it found, and, outside their own family, the best places for young children to meet such role models are nurseries and schools.

Many of those questioned for the survey said they believed boys behaved better for a male teacher, adding that it was important for boys to have a role model to look up to.

Thom Crabbe, the CWDC’s development manager, wants more men to consider working in under-fives childcare, and the region’s colleges are echoing the plea.