Terrific piece in Ohio State's student paper The Lantern today by Briony Clare.
According to Census Bureau reports, women are earning degrees at higher rates than men.
I have a theory about why this happens, after the jump.
According to the story,About 33 percent of women aged 25 to 29 had at least a bachelor's degree in 2007, compared with 26 percent of men.
Although there are still more women than men earning degrees from Ohio State, the gender gap is less than the national average.
"Ohio State does not have a huge discrepancy compared to a lot of other places," said Martha Garland, vice provost for enrollment management and dean of undergraduate studies. Garland said OSU's enrollment ratio of males to females is close to 50-50, also a deviation from more disproportionate national figures.
Garland says there isn't a "huge discrepancy" at Ohio State? At Ohio State, since 2001, the percentage of women completing a degree in four years is a whopping 21 points higher than men, at 50% to 29%.
The article discusses some possible reasons..."Nationwide there are scientists and scholars trying to figure it out," Garland said. "Girls always tended to be better students and are able to adapt better to school environments."
...but my suggestion to researchers is to look at literacy rates. Here in Ohio, most of the data I've looked at over the years shows girls k-12 scoring much higher on average in reading than boys. There are plenty of environmental factors to explain this, and there are lots of other possible theories that could explain why men leave college and enter the work force.
But I think literacy levels have a great deal to do with it. Culturally it's more acceptable for girls to read well, to focus on schoolwork, and to succeed in academics at the expense of sports and other extracurriculars. These differences are a significant factor in college success.
I suppose, although I haven't studied the data, that the war might have something to do with it as well? What do you think?
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Why are women earning degrees at higher rates than men?
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5 comments:
I have a theory, but I'm not sure it has legs.
Parents tend to keep girls home more than they do boys. That leaves more time for girls to read, study... okay, and text and listen to iPods. But you get what I'm saying.
While the guys are out cruising around, the girls are getting smarter.
Which, of course, explains the brilliance of this comment: My smarts. I stayed home a LOT.
Snark.
I just realized I said the same thing you did, in different words.
I'm not as smart as I thought.
I should have stayed home more.
I don't think there's any doubt that girls read more and have higher reading scores on average than boys. It's an achievement gap that isn't discussed nearly as much as the gaps between races, or between genders in math and science.
I think a big part is that many organizations promote math and science for girls, trying to get their math scores up to boys'. No one trys to bring boys' language scores up to girls'. I receive information from my daughters' schools about improving their interest in math and science and I've seen plenty of national organizations that do the same. I've never seen or heard of a similar movement for boys.
You make a good point Mark.
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