johns hopkins vs. smith

Momwaitingfornew
Sun, 23 Apr 2006 10:29:19 +0000

I agree in part what you say, BJM8, especially since I had to live through all that myself; however, something has changed in the high school culture that has allowed girls to excel beyond the capabilities of their male classmates. I suspect it has to do with earlier maturity and the raised expectations of their teachers, although the full answer must be more complicated than that. If colleges across the nation acknowledge that female applicants are MORE qualified as a group than male ones, then something basic has changed in the educational system. Right now, it is much more difficult for women to get into elite colleges because co-educational ones want to keep the gender balance even, and so women compete against women instead of against the applicant pool as a whole. According to many, the low-end of the GPA/SAT spectrum of a school’s stats belongs to the men while the top stats show what women must achieve to gain admission. Obviously, this is an over-simplified view of things, but the anecdotal evidence I’ve seen bears this out. The exceptions to the stricter standards for women are in the predominantly male universities, usually with reputations for hard-core science, that need a larger, qualified female student body. The women who get in to those schools don’t have to be better, although they still must be impressive.

If this is the case, then women have outdone their male counterparts at least by senior year of high school.

I find it ironic that, in my time, it was also more difficult for women to get into college. The college I attended had recently gone co-ed and so allowed only one female slot for every three male slots. My application had to be much better than the majority of the ones from men. Of course, the numbers were not as staggering as they are now. Still, my daughter faced daunting odds.

Yes, she will be attending Smith in the fall. She had the choice of some great co-educational schools, but in the end, believed Smith offered the best and more diverse educational opportunities for her interests.