"What Boy Crisis" op-ed column in New York Times

Parents Forum
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<p>What Boy Crisis?
By JUDITH WARNER
It's been muttered for some time now in feminist academic circles that the "boy crisis" — the near-ubiquitous belief that our nation's boys are being academically neglected and emotionally persecuted by teachers whose training, style and temperament favor girls — is little more than a myth. </p>

<p>Now a major study has confirmed it. According to "The Truth About Boys and Girls," a report from the nonpartisan group Education Sector, most boys aren't just not failing; they're doing better than ever on most measures of academic performance. The only boys who aren't — the boys who skew the scores because they're doing really, really badly — are Hispanic and black boys and those from low-income homes...</p>

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<p>However the study does admit that there is a "boy crisis" for boys from Hispanic, Afro-Am and low income households. When the City of Detroit has a graduation rate of less than 30%, something is terribly wrong with both the school system and in the community at large. And if the overall graduation rate is 28%, I suspect that the graduation rate among boys is less than 20%. What a waste if human capital.</p>

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<p>Judith Warner and those in "feminist academic circles" are entitled to their opinions regarding the nationwide gender gap in education, particularly in higher education. But to call it a "myth" is disingenous at best. Once the Jan. 30 Newsweek article came out with its provocative "Boy Crisis" cover, it was only a matter of time before some counter study would come out to spin the issue a different way. Now it's that boys are doing "better than ever" and "more" are going to college than ever. Must be more international males, but it sure isn't American males. </p>

<pre><code> I don't trust a so-called "major" study when the findings fly in the face of real facts. A Kenyon College admissions officer stirred up a hornets nest in March when she referred to affirmative action for males because the numbers of male applicants were so low compared to females. Presumably, she wasn't lamenting the lack of only black and brown male applicants, but all male applicants. Kenyon had 1,848 male applicants to 2,400 female applicants.
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<p>Women are now solidly in the majority of college enrollment, 57 percent, with some flagship state universities showing an even wider gap. Thirty years ago, men comprised 58 percent of the undergraduate student population in the U.S., now it's 43 percent. But the education problem for boys is a "myth" according to Warner.</p>

<pre><code>Why let facts get in the way of a good spin? I suppose Warner and the AAUW will ignore reports such as the one released last week by the California Postsecondary Education Commission. Titled, "The Gender Gap in California Higher Education," the report shows that "males in every major ethnic group are underrepresented in relation to their representation in the state's population."

"Growing steadily for more than two decades, the gap is evident in all segments of CA higher education. The report shows the combined enrollment at the state's two university systems in 2004 was 43.6 percent male, even though males comprised more than 51 percent of the college-age population in that year. Also in 2004, less than 41 percent of those receiving bachelors degrees were male. The disparities in enrollment and degree attainment are seen across all major ethnic groups, with the largest gap visible among African American students."

Enrollment of females exceeded that of male UG counterparts in California's public universities in 1983 and that gap has been slowly widening ever since. Af-Am females have outnumbered men in UC and CSU since 1976; females became the majority among Latinos in 1985, but not among Asian/Pacific Islanders until 1977. "White females have outnumbered males in these two institutionsn since 1981, surprising to some who assumed white males had been the majority in college until very recently," according to the report. By 2004, female enrollment exceeded male enrollment in all ethnic groups.
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<p>The report states that CA community colleges have seen the same widening gap of women over men and it started in 1977, with females comprising 53 percent of the enrollment. By 2003, the gap had increased to 57 percent female. A similar trend can be seen in the WASC-accredited non-public four-year colleges and universities. In 1976, men constituted nearly 61 percent of the students enrolled in these institutions in CA. By 2004, according to the report, that gap had almost reversed itself with women comprising 57 percent of students enrolled. This is similar to national trends which show various estimates college enrollment ranging from 55 to 60 percent.</p>

<p>I suppose it was fine to launch a gender turf battle back in 1992, with the AAUW report on the disadvantage girls face in education. But it's not acceptable when the disadvantage is going against boys of (all ethnic groups). Personally, I don't disagree with the opinion that most of society's efforts should be focused on closing the achievement gap for Af-Am and Latino students, particularly boys. But to say that the problem boys of all ethnic backgrounds are having in educational achievement is a "myth" is just wrong.</p>

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<p>I don't find the Kenyon thing to be a statistic or even a study. Kenyon is the type of college that is going to attract a lot more women than men. I don't expect many 17-year-old boys to really, really want to go to a small school in the middle of nowhere. To extrapolate from Kenyon to the rest of the country is ridiculous.</p>

<p>Furthermore, application numbers are a poor sign of anything. Girls may very well tend to apply to more schools than boys - consider that it may be a confidence issue, with men thinking that they will get in places and women being more concerned about their chances. Yield on those admitted will help tell more of the story.</p>

<p>Ultimately, with men still making up more than half of law students and far more than half of engineers and MBAs, I feel little sympathy for them. What is the big complaint - they don't like to sit still in school? These aren't kindergarteners! Are these boys doing after-school sports? How about channeling their energy through athletics, debate, and science competitions - then see if they are still to "restless" or whatever to sit through art class. </p>

<p>Not anti-man... just a woman who is trying to break into very, very male-dominated professions... and one who realises that the high-paying jobs are still the ones that are bastions of masculinity.</p>

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<p>^^I agree - well said areisathena. </p>

<p>I will echo your sentiments as I too am "a woman who is trying to break into a very, very male-dominated profession..." </p>

<p>I can still see the glass ceiling and it has not been raised in a long time.</p>

<p>I wonder, though, if I would feel differently if I had a son?</p>

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<p>I have been wondering if increased pressure to achieve has anything to do with the increase in binge drinking and other destructive behaviors noted among teenagers and young adults. The NYT article seems to confirm that there is a link.</p>

<p>But then I think about the pressure kids in other countries --India, China, Japan -- work under -- and I wonder if they are also engaging in those behaviors.</p>

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<p>What's the difference in government and private spending on women (especially high and middle achievers in mathematics and sciences) compared to men? Does it matter that college going men, far more often than college going women, need remedial education in English at a much higher rate than women do in mathematics and science? Apparently not to those funding the research and efforts. And 7.7 million women a year going to college in America versus 5.5 or so men. What is equality? More overwhelming numbers?</p>

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<p>You speak of statistics stating that 30 years ago males dominated colleges, and now they don't hold the majority anymore. Did you consider that possibly the same percentage of men go to college, but the percentage of women doing so is just greater?</p>

<p>Many guys that I know do not want to go to college, they would rather get a more hands-on education. Girls on the other hand, ones who feel the need to prove themselves or get ahead, are much more likely to attend college.</p>

<p>I don't really see a huge problem in this personally; until the statistics start to get <em>very</em> disproportionate, there is no cause for alarm.</p>

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<p>Men still out-earn women, even among the lower ages (where women have the educational advantage). </p>

<p>I really feel like women fought for education to be a meritocracy - no favours, just open to them - and then, once that playing field was leveled, there is hue and cry about how bad it is for the boys. We're still behind in playing with the big boys. Politics. Board rooms. Partners in law firms. Athletics beyond college. Science. Salary. When was the last time you heard a man be asked if he was going to leave to have a family anytime soon? </p>

<p>Still out-performing women in so many venues. Still $0.76 for the man's dollar. A woman's college degree is still worth less than a man's college degree. No tears shed until it is more than one facet of life; no tears shed until there actual discrimination that affects us as society. Not a social trend that ruins the warm fuzzies, but invidious discrimination that hurts our civilisation, economy, and humanity. Then I'll be upset. </p>

<p>I don't think you would feel that way if you had a son - I think you would realise that it's still easy for him to get into school if he's good; that he still has advantages in many professions; and, ultimately, it's not like he'll be hurting for promotions.</p>

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<p>the .76 nonsense is so misleading. Here's a start.</p>

<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Male-female_income_disparity_in_the_USA%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Male-female_income_disparity_in_the_USA&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>I agree with everything Aries says, and I have a son.</p>

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<p>Me, too, parent of two sons.</p>

<p>Why should men need remedial English when the complaint is that k-12 education gives an advantage to girls because of the emphasis on verbal skills? </p>

<p>The programs to encourage women to go into scientific fields are designed to combat gender stereotypes that Aries has first-hand knowledge of--that women are not as capable as men of doing the work. But look at the stereotypes regarding fields that emphasize verbal skills: "What will you do with a degree in English or History?" They are different from gender stereotypes.</p>

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<p>If I earn less than a male with a similar educational background it is purely based upon the CHOICES I made. The women's movement was first and foremost a movement for choice. An education provides you with choices. More women are entering college now then men...and ultimately, therefore, women will have more choices. Female friends with similar educational backgrounds to mine who made different choices make as much as, and even more than, men. </p>

<p>A few days before this op-ed was one by Maureen Dowd about 'husband managing' and what she learned about it by watching zoo-keepers. It was a bit tongue in cheek but the reality is that the current cycle of social-gender-balance-bias is that men are needing all us clever, multi-tasking, have it all, do it all women to manage them. Bleh. </p>

<p>There are lots of opportunities, lots of problems in the world-- excluding any large percentage of the population from optimal participation in solving the problems and seizing the opportunities is simply not acceptable. Human rights. Social movement is evidently just like many other aspects of existance- characterized by ebbs and flows, pendular-with swings to extremes. </p>

<p>My vote for the great American crisis is obesity. Of course, obesity and underachievement in boys are directly tied to one single evil...video/tv/gaming addiction. </p>

<p>Yesterday my sister asked what I thought she might do about her son-- whose SAT's were 690/490/510. You can guess which is which. The boy has never read a book voluntarily. He speaks in an abbreviated and simplistic linguistic format in his first language. He is a wonderful kid but he has spent all his life playing sports(which he is great at) and in front of a screen-- </p>

<p>Before I moan and groan about the social injustices/educational barriers theories I first want to see a well designed study that correlates language achievement with this signficant societal change. Girls are cognitively less vulnerable to screen addiction due to innate physiological differences (read Simon Baron Cohen).</p>

<p>I want my sons and my daughter to have choices. On the 4th of July there are plenty of things to celebrate in America. Iraq, Wimbledon and the World Cup might not reflect our best. The chance to choose, the chance to have a second chance or to bloom later or whatever-- is the greatest of all American freedoms. The first choice that parents of boys should make is to curb screen time and to teach boys about the hidden agenda of schools- not so that they can be girls- but so they understand the rules of the game.</p>

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<p>Happy Fourth of July, everybody. Glasses (or plastic cups) raised in appreciation for the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights. Thank you Founding Fa....er Persons.</p>

<p>Well, I don't agree with everything Aries says and I have two sons. When I read articles such as the Newsweek "Boy Crisis" piece or the Not-a-Crisis article by Jay Mathews, I suppose I do read them as a mother of sons and as a friend of mothers with sons, but I don't read them from a pro-feminism or anti-feminism point of view. I'm not prepared to debate the entire feminist agenda. To me, this particular issue is not about glass ceilings or discrimination against women in law firms, corporate boardrooms, athletics beyond college, or child-raising decisions within the family dynamic. A bit narrower focus, please. It's about the education of America's kids and it's too important to be smothered or skewed by a gender-favorite ideology. </p>

<p>The trends described in the recent CA report have implications for education, the economy, and society in general and they warrant fair, even-hanbded, dispassionate, unbiased study. The Education Sector study is not that, IMO. There is something that really bothers me about a purportedly "major" study, implying great validity, that attacks the evidence of a crisis in education for males because it doesn't apply to affluent whites. Somewhat lower in the study, and in the Jay Mathews piece, and in the op-ed piece, is the acknowledgement that there is ongoing and getting worse not only a crisis but a catastrophe educationally for black and brown boys. But of course the headlines will not reflect this, the impression given is that the other media stories about a problem for boys in education is "myth." This just does not strike me as honest, scholarly research into a very complex issue. </p>

<p>Businessguy: I understand the lower percentages for male enrollment in college are a reflection of good news --- higher percentages for women in the last 30 years. I don't argue for turning back the clock to when males were 60 percent of the college enrollment and women were 40 percent. But the trends are moving beyond parity now and at least in CA public universities and colleges, the disparity encompasses all ethnic groups. Figures in the CA report show that the group of students admitted to all UCs for the freshman Fall 2006 class is 56.6 percent female. I don't think this figure is cause for hysteria but I think it merits a much more thorough and honest study than what the Education Sector came up with. I think it deserves to be looked at as a problem/issue that exists now in real numbers, and not be weighted down by emotional baggage from a previous era of higher ed policies. </p>

<p>I don't know if CA is a mirror for the nation as a whole. But in CA, in 2004, men were 51.3 percent of the college age population and women were 48.7 percent. In 2004, white men were 45 percent of the UG enrollment at CSU and UC and women were 55 percent; the gap was wider for Latino and Black males and females. Women also significantly outpaced men in degree attainment across all major ethnic groups. For whites, just to show that the disparity is not totally attributable to race, in 2004, of the total bachelor's degrees awarded by CSU and UC, 42 percent went to males and 58 percent to females. If these statistics at UC and CSU were reversed by gender, would there not be a hue and cry and a demand for not only studies but change, and pronto? You bet. </p>

<p>Anitaw: I agree with you that parents of boys could do a lot more to boost achievement levels by insisting on less video and more reading. Or perhaps K-12 education should do more to respond to the video phenomenon in boy culture. There ought to be more thorough unbiased study of the decline in male college enrollment and degree attainment.</p>

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<p>
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Or perhaps K-12 education should do more to respond to the video phenomenon in boy culture.

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<p>How? Forbid the use of videos in schools?</p>

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<p>jazzymom:</p>

<p>at the Cal State level, the female/male ratio is even more striking: some Cal States are more than 60% female.</p>

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<p>
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If these statistics at UC and CSU were reversed by gender, would there not be a hue and cry and a demand for not only studies but change, and pronto? You bet.

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<p>Indeed.</p>

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Why should men need remedial English when the complaint is that k-12 education gives an advantage to girls because of the emphasis on verbal skills?

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<p>You have to ask who are the people complaining. The boys need remedial English because the colleges they go to on average feel they are unaccetably poor at English, and at a much, much higher rate than schools feel that way about girls in science and mathematics.</p>

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<p>Well, there is a reason for the emphasis on reading and writing: you need to be able to read and write no matter what discipline you're in. Being able to distill a passage and write a cogent memo is very prized by companies, no matter what line of business.
The complaint about k-12 is that it emphasizes verbal skills too much, and that this emphasis privileges girls. So I don't see what else can be done to make up for boys' poor verbal skills. More of the same?
If there is a boys' crisis, is it a crisis of education? or too much watching video, which is not something the schools can do much about? Or is it the lure of gangs or the lack of value put on education among certain groups?</p>

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<p>From an article in a local paper last week:</p>

<p>"The California Postsecondary Education Commissions wants to conduct more research on why the percentage of males graduating from college has declined considerably over the past two decades....The request comes on the heels of a report presented Wednesday to the commission that shows males made up less than 44 % of the enrollment at the state's two public university systems in 2004, even though they comprised more than 51% of the state's college age population....The gender gap exists across all ethnic and racial groups, although there is particular concern about the disparity in the black and latino populations. Of the black students who earned bachelor's degrees from the Cal States or UCs, 67% were female and 33% were male. Among latino graduates that year, 64% were female, and 36% male...."</p>

<p>btw: Females comprise 66% of Cal State Bernardino's class.</p>

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<p>
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So I don't see what else can be done to make up for boys' poor verbal skills. More of the same?

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<p>Nothing would be more helpful for boy's verbal skills than huge efforts from the goverment and private agencies to improve girl's abilities in mathematics and sciences and shift focus there. Oh, wait, that doesn't make any sense at all. Why are you so ready to give up? It's not as if indefinite money can be funded into indefinite studies in various fields, including psychology, sociology, and education to name a few, to see what works and what does not.</p>

<p>Public schools are tools of social engineering. They can do a lot of things. Gangs and lack of respect for the value of education is probably a part of the current situation, but seems to leave out many other factors. Some schools are trying to make k-12 education seem more relevant to students in various ways, for instance. Did various efforts from the women's movement not try to influence the home in ways to change things? Is that not true of other movements? Why is helping boys different?</p>