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The Great Divide: The College Gender Gap

Commentary

The Great Divide: The College Gender Gap

By Rebecca D. Petersen

Looking back on a decade as a university professor brings back my first year, when more than half of the student body in my classes was female, even within the historically male-dominated profession of criminal justice. The percentage of female students within this and most other disciplines has continued to rise.

For a female within the criminal justice discipline, it’s pleasing to see women attending and graduating from college. For a mother of a young son and a member of society, overrepresentation of women in college, even within the androcentric field of criminal justice, is a concern. Census figures from 2004 show that every 100 women enrolled in college, there are 77 men; for every 100 men receiving bachelor’s degrees, women receive 135. This year Newsweek magazine even ran a cover story entitled, “The trouble with boys.”

The number of enrolled female students in college has been over 50 percent for three decades now, but only recently it been the focus of national attention.

A wide spectrum of explanations has been attributed to the increased absence of men on university and college campuses, each with merit in its own right, but each not without debate and controversy. And discussing the increased absence of males in college is not politically correct: While funds and grants exist for women and/or minorities or for researchers to study these groups, the same cannot be said for males alone.

The achievement gap between boys and girls shows boys dominating high school failure and dropout rates. Nationwide, boys make up 60-90 percent of high school dropouts and receive 60-90 percent of high school F’s. In April, the Center for Civic Innovation of the Manhattan Institute for Policy Research reported that that the nationwide 2003 public high school graduation rate was 72 percent for females and 65 percent for males. If boys are less likely than girls to graduate from high school, there will proportionately be fewer males attending college as well.

Being academically smart or motivated is not encouraged as much for boys as it is for girls. For boys “It isn’t cool to be good at school” but “It’s cool to be good at pool.” Coupled with that is greater social acceptance of dropping out from high school for boys than for their female counterparts.

When boys drop out of school, many are at risk of falling into the juvenile or criminal justice system. Males make up 75-80 percent of all arrests and account for 93 percent of the prison population. Add to that divorce and out-of-wedlock births, meaning that millions of America’s children are not raised without fathers or substantial male role models. Boys with absent fathers are more likely to be dropouts. This lack of physical and emotional male parenting and male role models takes a heavy toll on young boys, with no one to bond with or to remind him that school and academic excellence is a priority.

Then there’s the feminist movement, which, some would argue, has contributed to a “backlash against boys” and to the heavy reliance on women as primary caretakers, breadwinners and role models.

Similarly, who are young boys’ role models? “When I grow up, I want to be just like Daddy,” is passé. Today’s role models are professional sports players who are paid millions, often without attending or graduating from college. Boys get the message that they don’t need college; they’re going straight to the NBA.

There are fewer college admission hurdles and more incentives for prospective female students. Scholarships and funded programs aimed at girls’ underachievement in math, science and technology exist nationwide. For example, in 1994 Congress passed the Gender Equity in Education Act to provide millions of dollars in funding to research the plight of females. Such programs are glaringly lacking for boys, particularly in addressing their deficits in reading, writing and language arts.

Thirty years ago, men represented close to 60 percent of those enrolled in colleges and universities. Now, this figure has reversed and continues to increase in favor of women.

The nation’s priority is clear: to put this widening gender gap in academic achievement in school and in college and university enrollment at the forefront of action plans, policies and programs.

In an era of No Child Left Behind, it appears as if our nation’s boys are being left behind as the victimized sex in education both within K-12 and higher education. The good news is that this decline can be reversed by specifically targeting males for college, by improving high school graduation rates and by enhancing school achievement at all grade levels.

It’s not turning back the clock for educators to turn their focus on gender-specific education and gender-specific teaching methods. Strategies that help improve the number of males in colleges and universities nationwide will help reverse the trend and move this nation forward. The alternative is a discouraging future for young men, with far-reaching individual, economic, social and national consequences.

Rebecca D. Petersen, Assistant Professor of Criminal Justice at Kennesaw State University in Kennesaw, Georgia, wrote this commentary for the Georgia Public Policy Foundation.

The Foundation is an independent think tank that proposes practical, market-oriented approaches to public policy to improve the lives of Georgians. Nothing written here is to be construed as necessarily reflecting the views of the Georgia Public Policy Foundation or as an attempt to aid or hinder the passage of any bill before the U.S. Congress or the Georgia Legislature.