<p>I recently read a study that, frankly, caught me off guard. I knew when my daughter applied for college in 2007, it seemed that she and her female friends were more involved in ECs and often had stronger GPAs than many of her male friends in her high school. I thought it had more to do with maturity level.
Maybe, it has nothing to do with maturity? Maybe more young men sign up for the military rather than attend college? Maybe deomographics? Maybe it is something else??
How do you interpret this imbalance?</p>
<p>and the paragraph that caught my eye:
"Among other forces, mens employment prospects
have been impacted by their slipping level of educational
attainment relative to women. For example, the gender
ratio in college admissions has been 60 percent female
and 40 percent male for most of the past decade. For
the graduating class of 2010, 572,000 more associates,
bachelors, masters, professional, and doctoral degrees
were awarded to women than to men (Table 9). In fouryear colleges and universities, for every two males that
graduated, three females graduated.</p>
<p>Because I volunteer at a public high school, assisting seniors w/their applications & financial aid-many of whom are first generation-I am really trying to wrap my head up around this report and their findings…Why are men not choosing to seek a higher education?</p>
<p>I did post it on my facebook page,too…and these are 2 responses that I received.</p>
<p>1/I have three nieces from one side of the family and three nephews from another. Neither family has money issues which would prevent any child from going to college. All three nieces are in or are about to start college. All three nephews graduated from high school and chose not to go to college (they are college-aged or a couple years past it, and two of them are recently unemployed). I know I have a bias, but this situation is shocking to me.</p>
<p>2/Facebook let a friend of mine see my post, but since he is not a member of this group, he could not post directly here. He emailed me his thoughts, which I almost always find valuable, so I cut and paste them here: " It could be that advances made in women’s rights and civil liberties is finally catching up with demographics, and women simply want more education than men, or are more naturally predisposed to learning and that trend has not been able to express itself until now.</p>
<p>People assume that the fight for women’s right is ancient history. but changes like that in society actually happen very slowly, so it wouldn’t surprise me that we are just starting to see the results of it now. in any event as women become more educated they have and will continue to occupy more and more positions of authority in both corporations and politics.</p>
<p>I imagine the result of that will be politics and policies that lean more towards civil rights, green issues and socialism, and away from the kind of military industrial economy and careless capitalism (that has ruled the planet since the time of ancient Rome) that we have come to know under the rule of men…which is probably the reason why women have been kept out of the policies and politics process to begin with.</p>
<p>In spite of all the last minute wars and bellyaching and Romney zombies that come out of the woodwork, it looks like the “game” may be over as far as men are concerned. if men cant deal with a level playing field, they wont be able to participate in the new system. right now it looks like they just don’t want to participate, (equality for everyone? yuck!) but that trend could adjust itself too."</p>
<p>It has been my observation over the part 20 years or so that education is increasingly stacked in favor of females, and boyhood is defined as toxic. (I say this as a dyed in the wool feminist and mother of a boy who has been successful in the female-dominated educational structure.)</p>
<p>I agree with Consolation. Where I’m really seeing this is with my friends who have high accomplishing daughters. Nearly all of them are the primary breadwinners in their relationships. They are truly bringing home the bacon and frying it in the pan when it comes to children. It’s a bit sad for some of SAHMs that these women do not have the choices we had without sacrificing a lot more family income than we did. The difference in most of the cases is such that the family would be close to or at poverty level. </p>
<p>Though there have been gains, without doubt, it has not come without a price, and it will take time to see if the price is worth it overall. </p>
<p>In some countries, like Japan, the effect has been even more drastic, where the younger generation of women are not marrying or having children, as it is too incompatible with their career goals and match expectations. </p>
<p>I feel like a dinosaur and may well be one.</p>
<p>Well, maybe because the volunteers who assist in the college applications are not to subtle about their …um…distaste… for this gender. If I were a young man of any insight, I’m sure I’d be put off by someone trying to ‘help’ me who actually thinks my ‘game is over’.</p>
<p>As the mother of 3 sons, I have noticed the amazing amount of support, scholarships, and other opportunities available to young women. For boys, there is notsomuch. Yes, I feel that girls/women deserve equal rights/opportunities, however, I feel that the pendulum has swung a bit too far. Nowadays, males have more difficulty locating scholarship opportunities (When’s the last time you heard of a male-only scholarship?)</p>
<p>The only time I felt my S had an increased chance at anything was for admission to LAC’s, which are populated by more women than men.</p>
<p>I think girls do well in schools because in general schools reward the things girls do well. My boys weren’t too into clubs or organized activities outside sports. Two of them said “no thanks” even to NHS which is, you guessed it predominantly girls at their high school. The boys just aren’t into it. And they certainly chaffed at busy work that they didn’t feel was essential…you don’t hear that quite as much with girls. So there are differences in how students participate in the general 9-12 education which may or may not influence male feelings about signing on for another 4 years of education. But, if I think back on the last seven or eight years of senior scholars as my boys travel through our local high school the split is pretty even between the boys and the girls. When I think about the boys and girls in our expanded group of friends I could generalize that the boys tended to take more time in finishing their BA where the girls tended to go straight through four years after high school. </p>
<p>I know one exemplary young guy who dutifully went off and finished college in 4 years and landed a “real job”. He’s feeling very low these days because he feels like he “should have” taken a year off and just kicked back and seen the country. He is in a long term relationship and he feels very pressured about the decisions he made along the way. Finally there are more “career” opportunities that are financially stable and feasible and socially acceptable for boys than girls if you think about fields like auto mechanics, construction, the trades and culinary which seems to attract males (and females) etc. S1 has 3 male friends in culinary right now. One who did get a BA and two that went after working in restaurants for a year or two after high school. For women, since even administrative assistants tend to need a BA, there is not much outside of real estate and cosmetology that I can think of off the cuff.</p>
<p>Finally although I was a boomer kid, my mother was college educated and worked. My husband’s mom was college educated and worked so there was never a question that I would go to college although many girls did not when I graduated high school. My husband did, but it took him a long time to get a BA with periodic breaks when he worked. It is possible that those mothers who were SAHM with or without a college degree are highly influential on their daughters with regard to expectations of college. I also have always earned more $$ than my husband and have an advanced degree while he does not. I can guarantee you my boys don’t give a moment’s thought about who will earn more money in any future relationships they have…it simply won’t matter. As more families become like ours those boys and girls will enter their college years with differing expectations about what is normative. Isn’t that what women have wanted all along? It doesn’t mean that we are raising emasculated wishy-washy boys. Quite the contrary I think we’ve opened their eyes to more possibilities and given them carte blanche to make their own decisions. I have a very good friend who is a professional married to an engineer. Their son is not going to college but is pursuing a lifetime love of vintage cars and is at some “school” a distance away learning “more” about restoration than his dad can teach him. They are not wringing their hands filled with angst.</p>
<p>We spend alot of time musing about why so many kids feel like they have to go to college and pondering why schools don’t do a better job of channeling kids into technical fields. Fact of the matter is I feel like there are MORE of those opportunities for boys out of high school than girls. I think the girls feel like they have to go to college because there aren’t many opportunities without a degree.</p>
<p>It’s more unusual for a 4.0 high test taking boy to not head for college. But every once in awhile it happens (one of S1s culinary friends was a senior scholar). But if we drop down to the low B/C students who decades ago may not have headed for college I do believe more girls will head for a traditional college than boys simply because of their perceptions of how there lives might be if they don’t follow through to a BA.</p>
<p>As a feminist and a mother of two daughters, it is with great sadness that I think you are correct, and, as a feminist, and a mother of two daughters, I think we owe it to the men and boys to try to right this ship the same way we righted the ship for the girls.</p>
<p>There must be ways to get this on an even keel so that all talents and all points of view can be valued equally. I’m an equality of opportunitiest as much as I’m a feminist, and I do see an inequity here. It’s better for the girls, now, and maybe it’s time to figure out what the boys need, too. JMO</p>
<p>As the feminist mother of both a daughter and a son, I think Consolation is exactly right. The rate at which we’ve been medicating young boys is incredibly alarming.</p>
<p>David Gutterson (the writer of “Snow Falling on Cedars” fame) has a wonderful book about homeschooling called “Family Matters,” where he talks about the history of public education in this country. He says that public education in this country was set up largely to warehouse children of factory workers and to train the next generation of factory workers (hence the emphasis on the clock).</p>
<p>I look around in our area, for the motivated kids, I would say it’s that all of them go on to college, boys and girls. Where I see the imbalance is the unmotivated kids. That is probably 90/10 boys/girls, and even those unmotivated girls tend to go to community colleges or some kind of certificate type program (nurses aid or similar) where the boys just do nothing after high school.</p>
<p>I would be curious to see historical data on the % of boys that have gone on to college since say 1950 or so. I see information with ratios but is it that more women are going to college now that has turned the tide and the percent of men has remained fairly constant or has that number declined? Using round numbers, made up, say 60% of all men went to college in 1950, say in 2012 there are still 60% of all men, but in 1950 say there were only 12% women and in 2012 there are 85% of all women going. OR, is it that now in 2012 there are only 40% of all men going to college?</p>
<p>@Dietz-Forgive. The first quote you have attributed to me belongs to another person. I posted the responses in their entirety-w/o editing-these are not my positions, they are the opinion of another person.</p>
<p>I have to admit, my skin is not thick. I care so very much for the young people I assist. Both the young men, and young women. Please know that.</p>
<p>I think it’s a combination of a cultural shift and a technological one. 50 years ago woman were a vast minority on college campuses but frankly there were far fewer students in general who went to college. Most men worked in factory or construction jobs that did not require a degree. Those that did go to college were swept up by companies for science and business management positions (the specific degree was far less important back then). Women were more likely to stay home or take jobs that required little or no college experience (see “Mad Men”). The 1960’s, 70’s and beyond brought huge cultural change and expectations concerning family and careers were turned on their head. During all this vast technological change took place. Jobs which once did not require a college degree were being replaced by machines, computers etc. Jobs which were not replace by technology could often be moved overseas to places in which unskilled labor was much cheaper. Most jobs today can be done easily by either a man or a woman. I think a lot of young men today don’t feel that there is a place for them. Manual labor is no longer the option for most men that it used to be and even if they find it it no longer pays enough for him to be the primary bread winner. Men still dominate in some areas all though I suspect that too will change as women are encouraged in STEM fields. Engineering, Business Accounting, and to a lesser degree the sciences are still fields with more men than women. Good luck guys!</p>
<p>Sylvan they do not NEED to do so, but there are social pressures that make it more difficult for a male to be a nurse, for example. Just as there once was, for a female to be a physician. Now more than half those coming out of med school are female. Big change. </p>
<p>Also, there are also issues with being a male that make it more difficult to equalize things. When I was giving birth, a male nurse pathetically asked me, as he had to have permission, to be in there for the delivery. Heck, I’ve been through this 4 times before, so I said,yes, without a hesitation. The poor guy needed to be in there for a delivery, but all the moms he asked, refused permission, whereas they would say yes to a female. </p>
<p>My MIL is 85 years old and was very uncomfortable with a male nurse or aide. When we told the head nurse, she told us, “too bad”. Equal opportunity here and no sex discrimination. Well, my MIL complained she did not like the way her bottom was handled by the nurse/aide, and I asked to fill out a complaint form. That was the end of any male anything waiting on her, without a female witness right there. </p>
<p>With 5 sons, I can give a number of such examples and stories though my experiences have not been particularly lopsided that way. But I have seen this flip flop personally in terms of gender dominance as my generation was the one who revved it up.</p>
<p>Sylvan: I guess I hadn’t thought of it that way. Jobs and degrees that 30 ago (when I went to college) were largely occupied by men are now either elimated or are equally pursued by men or woman. Jobs that were predominantly sought by women (teaching, social work, nursing) are still predominantly being sought by woman. I could make generalizations as to why, but men do not seem to be interested in pursuing those fields. </p>
<p>The current exception to the trend of woman pursuing careers that were in the past men’s careers is STEM fields. I am the father of two daughters, one who wants to study engineering. I know a number of her friends are also interested in the sciences and expect that in the future the numbers of men/woman seeking engineering degrees will equalize.</p>
<p>I think it is hard to be a boy/man in today’s society. I know in our state flagship a male with the same stats as a female will have a harder time being accepted unless a URM. A male has a harder time if they chose a predominately female job (nurse, teacher, etc.) and are watched more for suspicious activities (no one would even think twice about a female teacher hugging her young student when they approach her, but a male teacher cannot do this). People even think twice about having a teenage male babysitter for young boys now a days. Women will even be wary of young teenage boys (alone or in groups)and men who might be passing them on the streets (no matter the race) where they wouldn’t if they passed a group of girls or women. On top of this, I don’t think the school system supports the fact that boys are different than girls in learning and in being able to sit still, harming some boys in the educational system. I’m glad girls are getting more opportunity, but it is sad how much harder it is for the boys today.</p>