Gozitan boys miss mum's cooking

Gozitan male youths seem to be more attached to Gozo than their female counterparts and are less likely to follow courses at the University in Malta.

A recent report suggests this attachment may be due to lack of training at school and at home on how to be self-sufficient and, consequently, males find it more difficult when living on their own in Malta.

According to University sociology lecturer JosAnn Cutajar, Gozitan males are less likely to have a tertiary education: "This might derive from the fact that Gozitan male youths seem to be more attached to Gozo."

Italy is renowned for its mammone - mummy's boy - but it looks like Gozitan lads may compete.

The report draws on the findings of Manwel Debono who, in his 2006 study, which discussed the educational choices and career aspirations of Gozitan students, maintained that male students are more likely to opt for a course at the Malta College of Arts, Science and Technology in Gozo rather than attending University in Malta.

The study showed that just 66 per cent of Gozitan male students aspired to follow a course at University, compared with 82 per cent of the female students. On the other hand, 34 per cent of the male students aspire to go on to Mcast that has a base in Gozo, compared to 17 per cent of female students.

Moreover, in a recent unpublished dissertation tackling the situation of Gozitan university students in Malta, Maria Grech Magro finds that the majority of Gozitan students - over 40 per cent - feel homesick when living in Malta. Nonetheless, 80 per cent find it worthwhile to leave home to obtain a degree.

Dr Cutajar says the male student preference for studying in Gozo might be linked to the fact they tend to receive less life skills training: "I think Maltese and Gozitan males are not taught to look after themselves and are not trained in basic skills such as cooking or cleaning.

"The Gozitans are tested earlier than their Maltese counterparts as they are more likely to have to leave home at an early age to start work or continue with their studies in Malta.

"The fact that Maltese and Gozitan females might be trained to look after themselves benefits them more when they have to leave home to study, work or get married," she adds.

Statistics regarding university attendance in Malta are not indicative of how many Gozitan males or females are self-sufficient, nor how many leave home before they get married.

"Some of these have to become self-sufficient at the age of 16 because they move to Malta for work or study purposes since employment and educational opportunities in Gozo are not as vast as those found in Malta," Dr Cutajar says.

However, she points out that the trend seems to have changed over a decade. In 1999, there were more Gozitan males attending university in Malta than females.

"So the issue might not just be that these males are not being socialised into taking care of themselves. It might be linked with the feminisation of the labour market, which means more 'feminine' occupations have been created due to the expansion of the service economy, namely education and health," Dr Cutajar says.

Since employment within the public sector offers the possibility of work in their home island, the percentage of Gozitans in the public sector - such as the police force, nursing, education or within government departments - is quite high in relation to their Maltese counterparts.

Even if they do not move on to tertiary studies, most Gozitan youths have to come to Malta for employment. If they are employed within the public sector, their training is still based in Malta and most are only transferred to Gozo after a decade or so.

"This depends whether there are any vacancies in Gozo for people trained in a particular job and whose turn it is to be transferred there," Dr Cutajar says.

So what can be done to ensure males are as self-sufficient as females?

"I think it would be lucrative to introduce training skills for both male and female students, Gozitans and Maltese. We are becoming a culture dependent on what we can buy, not what we can do," she adds.