Justifying discriminating against girls in favor of boys for college admissions

Applying to College
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When males were undoubtedly dominant, schools taught using auditory methods too. In fact, teaching was much more auditory then than now. Schools now can and do address different types of learners to a much greater extent than they did before the women’s movement. So, if boys are the non-audio and -visual learners, and girls do learn best through the traditional ways, teaching methods have been moving toward boys for some time now.</p>

<p>I do definitely see the gender split in my school though. My school takes kids who pass a certain test in elementary school, and in 7th grade (6 year high school) the genders are even. A ton of kids fail out in 7th grade, and those who do are mostly boys, but there are still enough new students coming in during 8th and 9th grade that it’s not noticeable. As time goes on though, there get to be fewer and fewer boys. By, 10th grade, I was in a Chemistry class with some 22 girls and 5 boys. And now I’ve become used to it. Outside of Calculus BC, Physics B, and Physics C, almost every class, and the APs to a greater extent, is majority female.</p>

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<p>“So, if boys are the non-audio and -visual learners, and girls do learn best through the traditional ways, teaching methods have been moving toward boys for some time now.”</p>

<p>Millancad! You said it much better than I tried to! Thanks so much. These have been the traditional methods for quite some time, and they served boys quite well. For thousands of years even…</p>

<p>It’s not as if there were many girls learning at Socrates’ feet…and Socratic seminar style teaching served boys just fine then. It’s funny, because most people thinking about classical education would point out that not much of it is visual and kinetic so much as rote memorization, and a lot of verbalization, as well as auditory skills being used.</p>

<p>But more modern education has plenty of visual/kinetic type learning opportunities. We are much more apt to let children try out things and learn by doing. I had an excellent teacher 6th grade who had us all take a test to see how we best learned, and then she went out of her way to accomodate each learning style. One of the boys had such a high kinetic learning style, that he would drum out beats on his desk during every test…which drove everyone crazy. So my teacher allowed him to test in the hallway, with headphones so the noise would distract him, but he could still move as he thought, and not disrupt the rest of the class. I happened to be a highly visual/verbal and slightly auditory learner, so I preferred to talk in class to work through ideas, but since I couldn’t talk <em>all</em> the time, my teacher gave me books to read constantly. At one point, I was reading two a night and returning them with comments on whether or not I thought the rest of the class would enjoy them. But straight reading, writing, and discussions have long been the style of a Classic education, or more recently, a Liberal Arts one. If we peg those things down a few notches, we do boys an even bigger disfavor…many top colleges have discussion and writing based curriculum/classes. </p>

<p>The question is, why does the standard way of doing things suddenly feel like it’s not helping boys the way it used to?</p>

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<p>in my AP US history class last year the boy girl ratio was about 4:1. girls are smart…</p>

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<p>Yurtle, thank you for your wonderful list of books with boy characters: "Red Badge of Courage, Where the Red Fern Grows, White Fang, Call of the Wild, Maniac McGee, The Sign of the Beaver, Holes, james and the giant peach…</p>

<p>Tons of Elementary books we had to read directed towards boys. Not to mention the fact that the book I get asked for most in my library happens to be Diary of a Wimpy Kid- at book aimed at boys- but checked out by just as many girls."</p>

<p>I want to point out something; all those books were written many moons ago. The most recent one you mentioned, “Diary…”, once again shows a boy character who is what, wimpy?! (I’m a second grade teacher, so I know the book). Wimpy is not exactly a “strong” character. Likeable, but wimpy just the same. Not like Franny K. Stein (the girl who is a mad scientist). See what I’m saying? Boys are portrayed as weak, girls are “strong” or at least feisty.</p>

<p>I don’t mean to diverge from the main theme of this thread, but I think the message to boys, over and over again…from very early on…is that they aren’t very ‘together’. How does that feel? Then, when the real challenge of school begins (that is, when they have to not only rely on their intelleigence, but use it…in middle school), boys start to back down (if they haven’t already).</p>

<p>I recall when my DS2 was in his middle school’s gifted program how ‘sad’ that a boy moved away and was replaced by a girl. He was darn-right angry. He said the girls were replacing all the boys and he felt very threatened, especially because he wasn’t exactly the goody-goody type. In fact, I think he was that kid who banged the drums in the hallway when he took his tests.</p>

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<p>i meant to write ‘boys are smart’^^ oops</p>

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<p>"Maybe admissions should be
gender and race blind</p>

<p>only admit based on gpa/grades/ec/rec…"</p>

<p>i agree. i really don’t think colleges should be discriminating based on gender or race, and i think that’ll eventually be looked back upon as as ridiculous as segregation or any other kinds of discrimination. i know that some people overcome a lot with their family situation and so on to achieve what they do, but i think that’s a PERSONAL situation for individuals, not something to stereotype groups by, and they can write about that in their essay/ have it in their rec and be evaluated that way. i do think first gen college should be a factor b/c it’s really amazing when someone can be the first in their family to go to college. there’s a huge difference between someone who grew up with parents who went to college and expect them to go to college also doing well in school, and someone from a working class family where that’s not encouraged/expected still excelling in school and finding time to do some extracurrics despite having to support their family.</p>

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<p>No, Yurtle, just no. Stop thinking girls are superior.</p>

<p>3)Face it, sports is dominated by men. I mean sure, women do sports too, but much more boys play sports than girls, and more successfully as well. There are also more boys who excel in music.</p>

<p>Now, I’ll admit that girls are generally better at writing. However, girls aren’t clearly better…</p>

<p>4)Girls don’t have better scores. They have a better GPA. What does that mean? They beg for As and suck up to teachers. GPA is absolutely meaningless. </p>

<p>On the other hand, boys score higher on the SATs. Though the SATs aren’t by any means the perfect test, at least it’s standardized and so can show something. </p>

<p>5)Boys do meet the expectations. As someone said in the discriminating against asians thread, US schools take a best graduate approach. Just because girls can suck up and get a higher GPA doesn’t mean they’ll succeed more than boys who mature a bit later.</p>

<p>Guys clearly do earn more than girls…</p>

<p>6)Again, boys aren’t doing worse than girls. I’ll agree though, that the whole school system in north america sucks, and everyone needs to do better, so in that sense boys do need to do better. However, they aren’t doing any worse than girls as you implied.</p>

<p>Again, just look at USAMO numbers. Actually, look at the top scorers of any exam/contest. </p>

<p>Oh, and to those who somehow have weird schools, well of the 2 highschools I’ve been to, </p>

<p>20/20 of the top students are boys
and 4/10 of the top students are boys. However, only 1/4th of the students are boys. </p>

<p>Of the ~10 people I know who scored higher than 2200 on the SATs, 1 is a girl. </p>

<p>Girls aren’t doing better than boys at all. They just mature earlier, and realize the importance of hard working.</p>

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<p>Currently, my AP European History class has like 3:2 boys to girls. In my AP Literature class, there is like 1:3 boys to girls.</p>

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<p>Username: Where have I said girls were superior??? I’m absolutely confused. I said that according to the article there were girls being rejected with qualified scores in order to make room for the boys in a ratio…but that they were also finding that sometimes they had to lower their expectations to do so. I have no factual proof to back that up! I just said what I did based of the article WHICH I CLARIFIED when I said it. :/</p>

<p>Two and Three are true if the article is true. The article quoted adcom officers implying that girls seemed more mature in interviews/essays in addition to other things. Thus ‘well rounded’. Three says EXACTLY the article’s premesis. </p>

<p>Five and Six are agreed upon by everyone here, as far as I know: EVERYONE wants boys to do well, and no one wants their kid to get rejected from a school.</p>

<p>I have no idea what any of that has to do with sports or music, frankly. And I’m offended by the implication that I beg for my grades. I don’t. I earn them just like anyone else, Male OR Female. </p>

<p>I really truly think you misunderstood what I said. I never once said girls were superior, just that this article says that not enough boys are doing as well as they could be. This article/thread IS CALLED “Justifying DISCRIMINATING against girls in favor of boys for college admissions.” so I based my statements off of that article which implied that there were simply higher numbers of qualified girls applying to certain schools. That =/= all girls are better. </p>

<p>I really don’t know how to clarify my point any further than that. Last year, the only kid I knew who went of of state was the valedictorian who went to Yale. He was also, a guy. This year, there’s a tight competition…I know several boys AND girls who have straight A’s 4.0 uw grades. And while there are plenty of girls in my AP Lit class, there are also tons of guys…ones who have been in honors classes with me since second grade, and ones who are probably smarter than me by a longshot (Photographic memory may help him though…xD) and to say that I believe that girls are automatically superior is silly because it’s just not true. </p>

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<p>“I want to point out something; all those books were written many moons ago. The most recent one you mentioned, “Diary…”, once again shows a boy character who is what, wimpy?! (I’m a second grade teacher, so I know the book). Wimpy is not exactly a “strong” character. Likeable, but wimpy just the same. Not like Franny K. Stein (the girl who is a mad scientist). See what I’m saying? Boys are portrayed as weak, girls are “strong” or at least feisty.”</p>

<p>Those books were written many moons ago, but so are most classical books… That’s the point. It’s Children’s literature, and a lot of it is pretty old. </p>

<p>Wimpy? Maybe, but he seems to be a fairly admired character. (My mother piped up here…and said you obviously haven’t read them because that wasn’t the takeaway message) </p>

<p>What about Artemis Fowl? Harold and the purple crayon? Franklin the turtle? Harry potter anyone? You can’t exactly say he isn’t supposed to be a heroic character…</p>

<p>Sammy Keyes. There’s actually several sports series we keep that are constantly asked for…each one has a hero character, and most of them are boys. Pendragon. Hardy Boys is still kept. Percy Jackson and the Olympians. Captain Underpants. Alex Rider. James Bond and Indiana Jones as kids. The timewarp trio. Many of the Louis Sachar books…a lot of Andrew Clements. Hank the Cowdog. If you know my brother, any of the kid’s Star Wars books. The Invention of Hugo Cabret. Gregor the Overlander. Joey Pigza. Eragon. Calvin and Hobbes if you want to boost vocab. It’s funny, it’s neat, and it uses more sophisticated language…so you may find kids coming back later and finally getting the verbal and the visual jokes. I think comics are a legit way to encourage kids to read, so garfield and dragonball Z as well as others make my list of books with boy heros.</p>

<p>For every Diary of a Wimpy kid there’s a Dear Dumb Diary. For every Junie B. there’s a Captain Underpants… <em>shrugs</em>.</p>

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Saying that girls are more deserving of college spots and that only boys need to do better in school implies that girls were superior at least in academia. </p>

<p>It doesn’t matter if you only argue based on the article, because you wouldn’t argue based on the article if you didn’t agree with it. Until that bogus article actually gives some credible source+evidence, it’s BS. </p>

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You said that girls were better in ECs as well. Music and sports were just some examples of ECs. Also, I didn’t say EVERY girl begged for grades. Just more girls do than boys. At least that’s what I’ve noticed. Girls tend to care more about marks. </p>

<p>Note that girls care more about marks, not actual knowledge. </p>

<p>Again, I don’t care if you were just arguing off of the article, because that means you’re assuming it’s true, which it isn’t.</p>

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<p>Fact:</p>

<p>Above average -> Exceptional Male students are better than the above average -> exceptional female students</p>

<p>the top of the male hierarchy is better than the top of the female hierarchy</p>

<p>however,</p>

<p>with terrible -> average students, females are better than males in general</p>

<p>because there are more terrible –> average students, females do better than males on average</p>

<p>however, once we look at the top, males are significantly better</p>

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<p>Yurtle –</p>

<p>I don’t buy your distinction between AA for race and AA for gender. </p>

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<p>I strongly doubt that in the case being discussed here, males are admitted who are NOT nearly, exactly or over qualified in comparison to the avg. female applicant. Only if you can show me the statistics will I accept your premise.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that both race and gender AA are more similar than different.</p>

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<p>Boys tend to be lazy. When you look at my school’s NHS, which is the biggest one in the history of our class, you can see it. There are 37 girls and 11 boys. Almost everyone of those boys is undeniably intelligent, but all I’d say all of them, including me, are also quite lazy. And we are the ones in NHS. Many of the girls however, are not the ones that are brilliant, but work hard. There actually few brilliant girls in my grade in terms of their intellectual level and way above average excellence in a particular subject, but most of them work hard and do well enough in most classes for the straight A’s necessary.</p>

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<p>K-12 schools have undergone many changes over the last 40 years that have negatively affected boys. I’ll just mention a few.</p>

<p>– Increased emphasis on verbal skills, often to the detriment of quantitative skills. For example, requirements to explain math answers in non-math language and the increasing use of math journals favors girls, who are typically one or two years more advanced in verbal skills than boys are.</p>

<p>– The middle school model, a recent development now in place in most areas, requires that student master organizational and time management skills at a stage where boys lag behind girls in these areas. This negatively affects boys’ learning across all subjects during critical learning years.</p>

<p>– Reading material has changed to incorporate more topics of interest to girls, which affects boys’ interest and motivation in reading. There is a widespread change in the “tone” of texts that disparages any aggressive behavior, e.g., war is always bad.</p>

<p>– The Whole Language fad replaced phonics instruction, which was a better way for boys to learn reading. For example, it’s been found that boys are less likely to be able to infer from the context what a word should be; they do better when they area able to sound words out phonetically.</p>

<p>I realize I’m generalizing about boys vs. girls, but these are valid based on the latest science.</p>

<p>BTW, most of these “innovations” lack any basis in sound research and are bad for boys AND girls. K-12 schools are just a mess.</p>

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<p>Yurtle – I just wanted to make the point that your comments have not successfully disputed WSJ piece, at least from what I can tell.</p>

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<p>The author did not claim that women don’t take risks at all, so his credibility is unblemished on that point.</p>

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<p>It doesn’t matter which stats are used, they still support the author’s point that men’s businesses have a disproportionate effect on the US economy. Again, I don’t see how any of the comments here have successfully disputed any part of this article.</p>

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<p>Hey folks – </p>

<p>Learning styles has become unquestioned dogma among many educators, despite the utter lack of evidence to support it.</p>

<p>[The</a> Answer Sheet - Willingham: Student “Learning Styles” Theory Is Bunk](<a href=“The Washington Post - Breaking news and latest headlines, U.S. news, world news, and video - The Washington Post”>The Washington Post - Breaking news and latest headlines, U.S. news, world news, and video - The Washington Post)</p>

<p>[YouTube</a> - Learning Styles Don’t Exist](<a href=“http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIv9rz2NTUk]YouTube”>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIv9rz2NTUk)</p>

<p>Most K-12 “innovations” lack basis in sound research. Sadly, educators continue to use our children as guinea pigs to try out their latest theories.</p>

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<p>It is absolutely true that the boys have suffered from these “innovations”. Just take the SATs. Back in Oct 2003, when the SATs were reconfigured, Time magazine wrote an article about how the SAT favored girls. </p>

<p>[Education:</a> Inside The New SAT - TIME](<a href=“http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1005973,00.html]Education:”>http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1005973,00.html)</p>

<p>“At first blush, the changes seem healthy enough. But inevitably, some students will do better, and some worse, on the new test. Girls tend to outperform boys on writing exams, so their overall scores could benefit from the addition of the new writing section. Boys usually score higher on the math section, but the new exam will contain fewer of the abstract-reasoning items at which they often excel.”</p>

<p>And another article on Sept 1, 2006…
"The story did make some predictions that turned out right. For instance, the new test favors girls more than the old test did. It is a long-standing tenet of testmaking that girls outperform boys on writing exams. For reasons I am not foolish enough to speculate about in print, girls are better than boys at fixing grammar and constructing essays, so the addition of a third SAT section, on writing, was almost certain to shrink the male-female score gap. It did. Girls trounced boys on the new writing section, 502 to 491. </p>

<p>Read more: [What’s</a> Good About the New SAT Test - TIME](<a href=“http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1521184,00.html#ixzz0WNIVjpTG]What’s”>http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1521184,00.html#ixzz0WNIVjpTG)</p>

<p>So again, my tenet: all these changes in our educational system is positively affecting girls to the detriment of boys. It doesn’t have to be that way, but it is. Just remember, this message for boys starts very early (no one can dispute the fact that boys mature later than girls). Today’s schools gear up their teaching earlier and earlier…kids going to ‘school’ at age 3. There are also studies that show how the gap continues to widen each year, because the boys are always playing catch-up. Add to this how boys behave in this environment: they’re noisy, disruptive, the class-clowns. How could that feel day after day, year after year? </p>

<p>Is it no wonder that boys choose video games and skateboards (that don’t give due credit in a college app) while the girls choose ‘amazing’ community service projects and Title IV sports? Kids turn off from school or do those amazing projects because it’s reinforced from years earlier. This phenomenom doesn’t suddenly occur when kids are filling out a college application, it was building from pre-school.</p>

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<p>PayFor is right here. I am the parent of a high achieving boy (top 5%, conservatory caliber musician) and a high achieving girl (high grades, accomplished non-professional actress/singer, athlete). My son was and is consistently taught by women who implemented many of the “reforms” PayFor mentioned. You can’t emphasize enough the reading lists forced down boys’ throats during their formative years. My son came back from his junior year summer reading, jokingly, “Every time I read one of these books, I die a little more inside.” </p>

<p>Education through high school has been feminized. [NO CITATION NEEDED UNLESS YOU HAVEN’T BEEN PAYING ATTENTION] Boys are getting pushed down on the class rank scale, on the list for opportunities in EC’s, for part-time jobs as students, etc. The result of this is that on paper and as a group, the female applicants look better. That doesn’t, however, mean that they are better, however you define better. And unless you believe in some sort of Bell Curve analysis that proves women are, as a group, better than men, in a world that’s basically 50/50 male/female, absent other compelling factors, highly selective schools ought to be admitting people near that ratio.</p>

<p>I’ve also had the good fortune to do some teaching and coaching over the past two decades. I’ve learned that boys and girls, as groups, learn differently but that both are equally capable of and interested in learning and achieving.</p>

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<p>Oops, from my earlier post. The SATs were reconfigured in 2006, but the Time article appeared in 2003 and again in 2005 or 2006.</p>

<p>Cheers for your anecdote speihei. True here too.</p>

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<p>Wow, my school must deviate from the norm. I had a 1:1 boy/girl ratio in every AP and honors class I’ve taken.</p>