Male educators, especially at the elementary school level, are a shrinking minority. Only 9 percent of the country's elementary school teachers are male, according to the National Education Association's (NEA) 2003 report "Status of the American Public School Teacher." Although the NEA's statistics were drawn from the 2000-01 school year, they're still considered definitive by those keeping tabs on men, who, according to the report, amounted to just 21 percent of all teachers. The report covers a 40-year span, and the midway mark, 1981, seems to have been a renaissance year for males, who accounted for 33 percent of all teachers and 18 percent of elementary school educators. Efforts to increase the number of male teachers are gathering steam, however. For several years now, Clemson University's Call Me Mister program, for example, has been directing African American men toward education studies in college. And NEA members are now asking that the male-shortage problem be considered a priority. According to Tom Blanford, associate director of the NEA's teacher quality department, they don't have their marching orders yet, but they can see it coming. What they're already up against is the perfect societal storm. In 2002, after surveying members of the National Association for the Education of Young Children, MenTeach, a nonprofit that seeks ways to recruit male teachers, confirmed what many believe are the primary reasons men stay away from teaching: low wages, a feminine stereotype, and fear of being accused of abuse.