Justifying discriminating against girls in favor of boys for college admissions

Applying to College
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<p>I didn’t necessarily say faster…I just meant at ALL.</p>

<p>There are some boys who’ve obviously never been pushed by there parents to do anything of maturity-- not what’s considered right and responsible for their age, or even a younger one (For an everyday person, obviously there are exceptions for those with disabilities and such). When a parent neglects ANY child’s education, and fails to see it as a continuous process, there are problems. </p>

<p>My point is that these boys aren’t even hitting their grade levels, much less being prepared for college. I believe it’s in part to the lassiez faire “boys will be boys” attitude many parents (not all) have.</p>

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<p>If they are gonna go down that path, they ought look at the female-male dichotomy at the engineering and tech schools, starting with MIT & Caltech, and then move onto undergrad biz schools – all of which favor girls over boys. :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>Bluebayou- I would argue it’s not quite the same: There are such a tiny percentage of women in Science/Engineering/and even to a lesser extent Business that the disparity is FAR over 60-40. And standards (as far as I know) aren’t lowered so obviously for women, even at MIT and Caltech. </p>

<p>In nearly every other field women are nowhere near dominating the field entirely (save for a select few, probably education and nursing) but in MANY more fields (often ones that make much more money) Men dominate the field almost entirely.</p>

<p>"According to the National Science Foundation, women today earn 27% of doctorates in the physical sciences and 17% in engineering. But they make up only 10% of university faculty members, says Alice Agogino, a mechanical engineering professor at the University of California-Berkeley.</p>

<p>…</p>

<p>What the panel found was “scary,” she says. “Over two-thirds of the male faculty had children, and less than one-third of the female did. That says it all. The women either had to make a choice of forgoing children or having a career. They couldn’t do both.”</p>

<p>Nancy Kolodny, a chemistry professor at Wellesley College, says she sees many former students waiting to have children until after they have gotten tenure. She finds those decisions troubling because of their effect on the women’s ability to have children at all. </p>

<p>A highly regarded Swedish study found universities were hiring less-qualified men over qualified female applicants for postdoctoral positions, Agogino says."</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2005-01-19-summers_x.htm[/url]”>http://www.usatoday.com/news/education/2005-01-19-summers_x.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Unfortunately, I can’t find the sweedish study atm.</p>

<p>"Many young students see math and science as difficult, and don’t take any more classes than they have to, not realizing they are cutting themselves off from lucrative opportunities in college and careers. Recent studies show that girls have closed the gap with boys in mathematics, for example, but even now 20 percent of graduates with degrees in engineering are women yet only 11 percent of engineers are women… The study confirmed that old stereotypes die slowly. Both boys and girls perceived that teachers thought boys were stronger at math and science. For boys this represented a support, while for girls it acted as a barrier. "</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.scientificblogging.com/news_releases/why_girls_leave_science_and_math_confidence_says_psychologist[/url]”>Why Girls Leave Science And Math - Confidence, Says Psychologist | Science 2.0;

<p>While I can see that the opposite might be true for boys with English/social sciences, the gap is much smaller…</p>

<p>Boys/Men make up 89% of all engineers? And 90% of Faculty members in Engineering/Science? That’s far more than a slight gap and even STILL men are getting hired over women!</p>

<p>"Illegal discrimination against women seeking faculty positions at America’s research universities has been getting worse, not better, over the last ten years. Women are obtaining Ph.D.'s at ever increasing rates, but are not being hired or promoted into tenure track or tenured faculty positions in proportion to their numbers in the employee pool. In 1981, women were 35% of U.S. Ph.D. recipients, held 27% of theU.S. full-time faculty positions, and were 12% of the faculty at UC. In 1991, they were 44% of U.S. Ph.D. recipients, 30% of the U.S. fulltime faculty, and 18% at UC. </p>

<p>The percentage of women faculty in the UC system lags far behind the national norm. Research universities, in general, hire fewer women faculty than nonresearch colleges and universities; the more prestigious the type of institution, the fewer the women faculty. In 1987, women were 37.9% of the full time instructional faculty at public two year colleges, 20.7% at public research universities, and 19.5% at private research universities. In 1987 UC had 14% women as full-time instructional faculty. In 1992, UC women had increased their share, reaching 19% of UC’s ladder faculty. </p>

<p>If women are not being hired at equitable rates into ladder faculty positions, where are these women with Ph.D.'s going? They are going into the less prestigious, lower paid, often temporary, nontenure track positions of lecturer, instructor, researcher, or adjunct faculty. While the percent of women full professors at public research universities rose from 6.7% to only 10% from 1972 to 1992, the percent of women instructors increased from 44% to 61%.</p>

<p>UC follows the same patterns. At UC Davis in l991, women were 10% of the full professors, 17% of ladder rank faculty, and 51% of the lecturers. At the current rate of change in the faculty’s gender composition, at UC Davis it will be 57 years before women hold 50% of tenured faculty positions, and 83 years before women are 50% of the full professors.</p>

<p>Further indications of the lack of progress of women in higher education are the percents of faculty women and men who have tenure. In 1975, 65% of the male full time faculty had tenure, and 46% of the women. In 1992, men had reached 71%, while women were still at 46%. The data show that the popular myth that women have “made it” in academia is just that, a myth, with no basis in reality.</p>

<p>…</p>

<p>. A recent example: at UC Davis, we opened a new neuroscience center in 1993, hiring six new faculty members. The director, male, was hired with tenure. He then hired five new assistant professors in a field where women now are 37% of the available pool. These hires were all men. Not one woman was hired through this “open” recruitment. One way the UC system limits the number of women is by hiring faculty at higher, tenured ranks. 40% of faculty hired by UC since 1984 have been to tenured ranks. Only 18.5% of these hires were women, not surprising since only 20% of the faculty teaching in U.S. research universities were women. The pool for candidates for entry level positions is the pool of recent Ph.D.s, 44% of whom are now women. In UC we find that 32% of those hired into the entry level assistant professor positions have been women. Although this figure is below the percent of women in the Ph.D. pool, it is a significant improvement over the 18% of tenured hires."</p>

<ul>
<li>1994 <a href=“http://www.wage.org/doc/text/2ucwomen.html[/url]”>http://www.wage.org/doc/text/2ucwomen.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/li&gt;
</ul>

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<p>Thanks, Yurtle for explaining in post # 19, my stance. </p>

<p>Great data on the women professors in science/engineering!</p>

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<p>“Just one out of 25 faculty members granted tenure this year at MIT is female, a gender imbalance that appears to contrast with the university’s decade-old effort to boost the status of women.”</p>

<p>16% are tenured faculty.</p>

<p>Even if women are getting into MIT and Caltech more easily, what can they really do with those PhD’s? It goes back to what I said earlier… I may have all the same degrees, but boys will get hired over me, almost every time. </p>

<p>[Tenure</a> at MIT still largely a male domain - The Boston Globe](<a href=“http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2007/12/06/tenure_at_mit_still_largely_a_male_domain/]Tenure”>http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2007/12/06/tenure_at_mit_still_largely_a_male_domain/)</p>

<p>“MIT set off a national examination of gender equity in higher education in 1999 when the university published a report on gender bias in its School of Science. The group, led by Nancy Hopkins, a tenured biology professor and longtime leader on gender equity issues at the university, said in the report that the school routinely underpaid, marginalized, and disrespected female faculty in numerous ways, including providing less lab and office space and giving them scant representation on hiring and funding committees… At the urging of then President Charles Vest, who agreed with the report’s findings, MIT created committees to study gender bias at each of its schools. In 2002, reports from those committees reached the same conclusion about their individual schools: gender bias was pervasive.”</p>

<p>It’s not just a case of less boys in school because they aren’t as qualified, it’s a case of girls actually experience a gender based bias in school for science/math/engineering at these levels. </p>

<p>The rest of the article leaves of on a slightly lighter note: MIT is trying to fix that problem.</p>

<p>_</p>

<p>You’re welcome Fauve! This data is fascinating…although a bit much for people who want a quick read. xD;</p>

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<p>Every year at decision time we see lots of boys rejected from MIT whining over the girls who got accepted with stats lower than theirs. There have been things posted documenting significantly lower average stats for accepted girls at MIT compared to boys. I don’t think this is true or as true at Caltech where they are far less dedicated to maintaining balance between the sexes (and it shows - Caltech is much more male heavy than MIT).</p>

<p>The problem is that selective admissions is a zero sum game. Whenever one group is favored then applicants not in that group are by definition unfavored. If you really want to fight this battle, go join the Affirmative Action/Race in Admissions threads. It’s the same issue - using admissions to maintain some desired balance at the school between the races/sexes/ethnicities that would not exist if admissions were done by stats alone.</p>

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<p>They may not be “lowered”, but the simple fact is that admission rates are significantly higher for females, even at Caltech. A year or so ago, a couple of quant jocks ran the numbers for Wharton and suggested that females have an acceptance rate 2x that of guys at that undergrad B-school. (Not sure if true, but the numbers were interesting, to say the least.) In any event, with undergrad B-schools typically 65% guys, – which is on the “wrong” side of that 60% “threshold” – girls just have to be receiving admission tips to b-schools.</p>

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<p>Discrimination in hiring is illegal, which is much different than discussing admissions, where the Supremes have a different position. But, more importantly, I thought the subject of this thread was college admissions, not faculty/research hiring. :)</p>

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<p>My point was that EVEN IF women are getting more degrees, it’s unlikely they will get the jobs that make anywhere near the amount guys do. The idea is that the disparity is worse, because the women with those degrees aren’t getting into the jobs that those degrees generally feed into. If you think the problem ends at: “There are less boys than girls” then you’ve failed to noticed Post-graduation results…that even if there are less guys, or a significant pool of women, women are less likely to be hired or paid for the same degrees and education. So is it really that negative to have more woman getting those degrees? </p>

<p>"Every year at decision time we see lots of boys rejected from MIT whining over the girls who got accepted with stats lower than theirs. There have been things posted documenting significantly lower average stats for accepted girls at MIT compared to boys. I don’t think this is true or as true at Caltech where they are far less dedicated to maintaining balance between the sexes (and it shows - Caltech is much more male heavy than MIT).</p>

<p>The problem is that selective admissions is a zero sum game. Whenever one group is favored then applicants not in that group are by definition unfavored. If you really want to fight this battle, go join the Affirmative Action/Race in Admissions threads. It’s the same issue - using admissions to maintain some desired balance at the school between the races/sexes/ethnicities that would not exist if admissions were done by stats alone. "</p>

<p>Absolutely not. I refuse on the grounds of my sanity to try to Argue AA which is NOT the same as gender differences in admission. People have a very misconstrued view of it in general, and it’s just easier to not try and tackle such ignorance on a day to day basis.</p>

<p>“Every year at decision time we see lots of boys rejected from MIT whining over the girls who got accepted with stats lower than theirs. [SOURCE] There have been things posted documenting significantly lower average stats for accepted girls at MIT compared to boys. [SOURCE]”</p>

<p>Anecdata does not count. The small sampling on CC =/= all of the admissions process, or even the girls who go. At any rate: 46% Women
54% Men </p>

<p>Those women would not graduate if they didn’t have it in them (or even return):</p>

<p>Percent of students who return for sophomore year: 98%</p>

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<p>“Absolutely not. I refuse on the grounds of my sanity to try to Argue AA which is NOT the same as gender differences in admission. People have a very misconstrued view of it in general, and it’s just easier to not try and tackle such ignorance on a day to day basis.”</p>

<p>You really should join those threads. By definition, affirmative action is any policy that takes such things as race, ethnicity, and gender into consideration to promote equality. Preferences based on gender and race are basically the same thing.</p>

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<p>DATA…</p>

<p>MIT common data set:</p>

<p>Number of men who applied: 9464
Number of men who were accepted: 828</p>

<p>Number of women who applied: 3932
Number of women who were accepted: 761</p>

<p>% of men who were accepted: 8.7%
% of women who were accepted: 19.4%</p>

<p>More than 2x.</p>

<p>Caltech common data set (2004 – most recent I could find online)</p>

<p>Number of men who applied: 2120
Number of men who were accepted: 374</p>

<p>Number of women who applied: 641
Number of women who were accepted: 192</p>

<p>% of men who were accepted: 17.6%
% of women who were accepted: 30.0%</p>

<p>Nearly 2x.</p>

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<p>Sanguinity: </p>

<p>I maintain my stance. AA gives me a headache more than this does…</p>

<p>Perhaps because I feel racial issues hit much more closely to home as a Female POC rather than just gender issues. Racist remarks and basic inability to try to understand the other view points have made me scroll past any possible racial discussion here on CC other than “Which one should I mark down?” If I want to discuss race and AA, I’ll go here: [Talking</a> about the hard stuff](<a href=“http://community.livejournal.com/racism_101/]Talking”>Talking about the hard stuff — LiveJournal) or any of the number of Anti-racist blogs that exist out there. </p>

<p>But never here. </p>

<p>…</p>

<p>As for what BlueBayou is saying, perhaps my math is terrible, but there’s only a 67 person difference at MIT and a 182 person difference at Caltech…both of which is in favor of the boys. This doesn’t prove that the girls were less qualified by any means. </p>

<p>You’ll also notice that there’s a 5,532 applicant difference of men v women at MIT and a 1,476 difference at Caltech. If any of the articles I’ve been reading are right, then the women’s applicant pool to these places (MIT and Caltech) are self-selective. Not many women will apply if: 1.) It’s a tough, male dominated field (to the point of feeling slightly unwelcome) AND 2.) they know they aren’t qualified at all. The girls who are truly interested in what the schools have to offer will be a self-selective pool…those girls are as far as I know, quite qualifed…and as the article suggested, perhaps even more so.</p>

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<p>I’m sure I will get flamed for this. Whenenever race is brought up, people get attacked for no reason. Anyway…</p>

<p>How is this any different than minorities with lower stats getting accepted into schools and a white person with the same qualifications getting rejected? Schools are just trying to maintain some diversity. They aren’t being sexist and favoring males.</p>

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<p>Honestly, though? Diversity and balanced male-female ratios are attractive traits in a school, so by accepting a few weaker applicants, they’re keeping their pool of applicants strong. Of course it’s not fair.</p>

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<p>This whole topic has driven me CRAZY since the days of “take your daughter to work”. Thank you Gloria (sarcasm). </p>

<p>I am a teacher and immediately see how boys struggle, from the beginning, compared to girls. Boys: immature, not verbal, big body movements, (terrible fine motor skills), not people-pleasers. Girls: the teacher-helper, verbal, quiet, early reader, good fine motor, etc. Is it no wonder that boys have a negative attitude about school after years of frustration? </p>

<p>Yes, yes, yes…I know. I sound terribly sexist. Sorry… But it wasn’t until recently that the media became alerted that boys are struggling. Why is this an issue now, when men have had struggles for quite sometime? (Even the point of the editorial by the admissions person from Kenyon was a put-down to men, saying it’s too bad she had to turn down such capable women.) The way i see it, all the moms of girls want a double standard. They like to see their daughter become aggressive (called assertive), and the boys are expected to allow it. How about building UP the men psyche, the way things changed around for women by the Ms Foundation in 1973, 36 years ago? “Ms. Foundation turns its attention to platforms that nurture girls’ voices and leadership.” </p>

<p>I remember once going to a park in NYC, and the mom allowed her daughter to push in front of two boys I was supervising on some ladder. The boys were kind of stunned, and so just let her pass. But, I didn’t think it was “right” and asked the girl to stop pushing. (It was dangerous too.) Surprisingly, the mom yelled at me for “touching” her daughter, but said nothing to the daughter about her behavior.</p>

<p>And I remember years ago when one student (not my student) was crying at a lunch table. I asked him what’s up? He said he has “to be nice” to girls and “open doors” to girls, and yet he didn’t understand why girls push him in the line when he can’t push back.</p>

<p>Now, I’m sure some readers would say that girls aren’t allowed to push either, but they are simply more discreet than one would expect. I don’t have a good solution, sadly. I think boys need a lot more help w/ early reading and need to find books that they like. I think boys should also be encouraged to take an extra year, but that’s not always necessary or possible. I think boys need a lot of fine motor training, a forgotten art. </p>

<p>But, I also take heart that in this world of technology, I hope the playing field will even out.</p>

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<p><em>sighs</em></p>

<p>Because those whites aren’t getting rejected in favor of the minority student directly? No one says in admissions “OH ANOTHER WHITE KID. <em>REJECTS</em> LOOK AN URM! WE’LL TAKE THEM!! LOLOLOL.” That’s just not how AA works. And frankly, AA doesn’t really say ‘less qualified’ the way people think it does. The idea of AA is that there should be space for a minority applicant who is nearly, exactly or over qualified in comparison to the avg. white applicant. Not that the white applicant gets rejected in favor of the urm for that sole reason, but that the minority applicant has a chance, even if they ARE a minority. </p>

<p>In the beginning, there was actually tons of structures set in place (many of which remain today) that acted in place of AA in favor of whites. (This extended to businesses, houses, jobs, etc.) Plently of institutionalized racism pervaded to such a point that racism and socio-economic gaps created the NEED for AA. Unfortunately many of those hurdles for Minorities remain: If you haven’t noticed they ARE still underrepresented. </p>

<p>But men? In general? Men have always had a leg up in admissions in general (not counting race of each specific man). I repeat, it’s not quite the same. In this case, schools are LITERALLY looking at the gender of an applicant and BLATENTLY favoring the student based on that gender…even if the grades/scores/ecs/whatever are clearly not up to par. This doesn’t happen in AA with RACE… it wouldn’t fly. An applicant severely under the school’s range would get rejected, even if they were a black-native american-hispanic kid. Or something. </p>

<p>That’s not what’s happening here…here, schools are purposely rejecting superior applicants in favor of gaining more boys. That doesn’t happen with white kids…if you got rejected, it’s because you weren’t good enough, not because the minority “STOLE” your spot. That phrase alone sets me off…as it implies that being white earns you a spot anywhere…which is what AA is trying to offset.</p>

<p>In this case it’s a sole issue of merit, and I could see ‘stealing’ as being somewhat more applicable. There is really LESS discrimination against the average white male than the average female (white or otherwise.) </p>

<p>But that’s getting into feminism too, and when I mix feminism with anti-racism and AA support crap will REALLY hit the fan. ;)</p>

<hr>

<p>Too late! Limabeans started sexism FOR me!</p>

<p>Golly gee! </p>

<p>Why yes, those girls who pushed a boy were brats. The mother handled it poorly from what you saw. But none of your little anecdotes about the playground really relate to why there are less boys at school. Just tells us all that girls can be bullies too.</p>

<p>But seriously? “I know this is TOTALLY SEXIST BUT…”</p>

<p>Right. </p>

<p><em>rolls her eyes</em></p>

<p>"Even the point of the editorial by the admissions person from Kenyon was a put-down to men, saying it’s too bad she had to turn down such capable women.) The way i see it, all the moms of girls want a double standard. They like to see their daughter become aggressive (called assertive), and the boys are expected to allow it. How about building UP the men psyche, the way things changed around for women by the Ms Foundation in 1973, 36 years ago? “Ms. Foundation turns its attention to platforms that nurture girls’ voices and leadership.” "</p>

<p>It IS too bad she has to turn down capable women, they worked for it, so why should they be denied because “We need more men”? The idea that women are becoming more ‘aggressive’ because they’re persuing the same things men do and have done all the time is astoundingly offensive, and blatently sexist, so don’t play coy with that one. I’m sick of the 'she gets things done, and goes for her goals so she must be an agressive ball-busting b*tch." It’s old, it’s tired, and it needs to be done away with.</p>

<p>As for leadership for boys…those programs are and have been readily available for decades. I think the most commonly known one is Boy Scouts. </p>

<p>But boys have the Old Boys Club. More men are in the Senate, the House, 100% of men are president, and all but two of the 9 justices in the supreme court are male. You’ll find the majority of Governors are ALSO probably male, same with state congresses, etc. Most CEOs are Male. Most world leaders are Male.</p>

<p>So…why is it that men need EVEN MORE leadership programs? </p>

<p>:| It’s not as if they don’t have majority power…not at all… <em>sarcasm</em></p>

<p>"But, I also take heart that in this world of technology, I hope the playing field will even out. "</p>

<p>That was even more sexist. REALLY?</p>

<p>Look, don’t get me wrong, guys should be going to school. Maybe we need more schools! AND MAYBE WE NEED TO FOCUS ON HOW WE RAISE OUR BOYS INSTEAD OF FOCUSING ON “HOW DARE THOSE GIRLS ACTUALLY ACHIEVE SOMETHING AT THE SUPPOSED EXPENSE OF OUR BOYS even though that’s what we wanted them to do, and even though it’s not the girl’s fault that boys are doing poorly.”</p>

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<p>That may be because a school’s M/F ratio is a much more readily available and touted statistic. Race is much less clear, it’s a diverse world, remember? There are only two sexes…okay that’s less clear now, but you know what I mean!</p>

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<p>we’re still a country where women make 77 cents for every dollar men make at the same jobs, and where the large majority of academic, political, and business positions are held by men. WAY too soon to be favoring boys against girls for college admissions, imo. </p>

<p>and i’d actually rather not have the obedient, attention-to-detail, behaved mentality i developed in elementary school because i was praised for it. the girls i know care more about grades/pleasing teachers compared to boys, and are more perfectionist instead of seeing the big picture, and i think that’s part of what the school system fosters too. in my experience girls get praised for effort and behavior, but boys are really encouraged to show creativity and leadership. so there’s advantages and disadvantages to being both.</p>

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<p>Thank you sinflower.</p>

<p>A+</p>

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<p>I’m not saying that favoring males is right, but think of it this way:</p>

<p>At LACs like Kenyon, the students are very involved in their education. Would it make sense to just have students with similar personalities to debate with? Growth comes at the edges, and perhaps making sure there is a fair number of males is a way to do this. It’s not like colleges are like, “Oh this kid probably won’t cut it, but he’s got a Y chromosome, so he’ll do.” The males they accept are still qualified. The college has to make sure that it has its own best interests at heart. College admissions isn’t about rewarding those who “doing well in high school,” it is about schools trying to improve themselves by any means neccessary.</p>

<p>I don’t think that gender is necessarily a good way of going about this, but the stereotypical male is a lot different from the stereotypical female. Perhaps colleges are just searching for the right balance.</p>

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<p>I have heard, anecdotally, a ton of stories about how the gender imbalance causes social problems at schools. With the exception of Trinity, every single school my 2 Ds have considered has at least a 55-45 ratio, typically 60-40, sometimes worse than that. Read *****.com and you’ll hear over and over and over how the gender imbalance leads to even more random hookups than ever and fewer relationships. One friend’s son (a nice kid) couldn’t believe his good fortune when he went off to a college with the usual ratio and “could get any girl he wanted” – and did. </p>

<p>On the one hand, it burns me that a boy with the same stats as my older D got merit aid while she didn’t. And my younger D is beginning the search and will no doubt be turned away by schools while boys who are lesser students and school citizens gain admission.</p>

<p>But on the other hand, a strong gender inequity isn’t good for a school in a host of ways, and while my girls are not going to college to get MRS. degrees, it behooves their growth and education to be around a representative mix of people: gender, culturally, racially, religiously, etc. And from what I can tell, most of the boys catch up eventually in terms of maturity and work ethic. I know plenty of high school boys who aren’t the students that their girl friends are, but they’re still great boys, with intelligence and talent.</p>