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More than one third of primary schools across Cumbria have no male teachers.

There are 275 local authority primary schools across the county, but, according to figures released by the Department for Education, there are 99 primary schools across Cumbria with only female teachers.

The problem is mirrored across the country despite attempts by the previous Government to increase numbers.

The number of men working as school teachers has reached a five-year low leading to concerns about a lack of positive male role models.

A MEN-ONLY teacher taster course is being put on by the county council help encourage more men into the profession.

In 2001/02 there were around 1,500 men teaching in the county but a Government campaign has seen that rise up to 2,341 in 2008/09.

To help boost numbers Bucks County Council are holding their a three-day seminar in September which will include a school placement.

The Malaysian Education Ministry will set a quota and take in a stipulated percentage of men every year for teaching posts to address the dearth of male teachers in schools.

Education director-general Tan Sri Alimuddin Mohd Dom is confident the imposition of a quota will rectify the situation.

Scottish men are beings urged to take on key jobs with young children, such as nursery and primary school teachers - roles they avoid for fear of being suspected as paedophiles.

The Scottish Government wants more men to get involved in early years education in order to provide male role models, which are lacking in children's lives.

A campaign was launched to encourage more men to become primary school teachers to counteract the shortage of male role models in schools.

The Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDA) has organised events in schools around the country. Hundreds of men will attend the sessions in which school staff will talk about why they should join the profession.

In June 2004 KKCCC hosted the first Men in Childcare Conference which examined the issues of achieving a gender balance within the sector. Out of that conference a Men in Childcare Network was established and they have gone on to host two further conferences each year since.

The Men in Childcare Network support and encourage men who are interested in a career in childcare.

A major push to increase the number of male teachers in primary schools is being launched this week in an attempt to overcome a serious shortage which experts say is affecting boys.

Hundreds of men will attend events in schools, where heads, deputies and teachers will try to persuade them to join the profession. The sessions are being organised by the Training and Development Agency for Schools (TDAS), which hopes to capitalise on a recent surge in interest.

Thirteen is the lucky number for Berwick Primary School, where 13 of the school's 40 staff members are male.

Principal Kaye Seton said the male teachers, often rare in a Primary School setting, provided positive male role models for students.

"This has not been a deliberate staffing decision but over the years the number of male teachers has continued to grow," she said.

With the absence of men in most households in Jamaica, Kayson Jones said a male teacher was very important in his mentoring process.

"I find that the children (boys) are excited to have a male role model, someone they can talk to, someone who look like them, someone who smell like them," said the educator.

Jones was accustomed to wearing light-coloured clothing to school. However, he avoids wearing them now.

What was once a female-dominated profession is becoming increasingly gender-netural, and more men than ever before are applying for post-graduate certificates of education (PGCE) in the field.

The university has launched Men in Primary, a scheme offering support for male students through a mentoring programme and a series of workshops.

A generation of boys will encounter barely any male role models throughout their education, opposition MPs warned.

In primary schools just one in ten teachers are male and in secondary schools just under half are men - a dramatic change from 20 years ago when men had a majority in secondary staff rooms.

Schools in the UK have started employing hired muscle in order to control rowdy classrooms across the country.

A London teacher revealed at the annual conference of the National Union of Teachers that bouncers were being taken on as supervisory staff to instil discipline in children and oversee crowd control. The initiative comes just months after a national call for more male teachers in British schools, after a study found that many teenage boys lacked a male role model to look up to.

Andrew Hall says some of his footy mates find his choice of being a prep teacher "a bit funny".

Probably because these days only 20 per cent of primary teachers are men and even fewer want to spend each day battling a bunch of five-year- olds.

But Hall, 26, fits in well at Darley Primary in Bacchus Marsh, where the 660 students have 12 men on staff: eight classroom teachers out of 29, plus men who are music, IT and physical-education specialists, and a shared IT technician.

Nearly one in 10 pupils at the Sunderland secondary school where Amer Sheikh works are from black and minority ethnic (BME) backgrounds, and yet he is the only black teacher out of 100: "I'm constantly aware of my ethnicity. For the black students, I feel I need to be a role model and for the white students, I feel I need to do my bit in helping them cope in a diverse society."

Headteachers say the number of male teachers working in Cumbria's primary schools is growing despite new Government figures which reveal men account for fewer than 30 per cent of staff in more than 200 schools.

According to new figures released by the Department for Children, Schools and Families (DCSF) male teachers account for fewer than 30 per cent of all staff at 231 of the county's 275 local authority schools.