<p>Thanks for the mini-lecture, katek, but it’s misplaced. Nobody is telling girls they “can’t” do or “aren’t” able nowadays. There is nothing holding girls back. In fact, most of the special outreach programs to encourage students to enter math and science fields are aimed at girls. In case you haven’t noticed, girls overtook boys in college attendance a long time ago and college women have recently overtaken men in graduation rates and the trend is continuing unabated across all racial groups. Pointing out that there are some aspects to K-12 education — at least in my kids’s school district — that seem to give girls an advantage over boys is not reinforcing a negative stereotype. It’s an observable fact in the classrooms I’ve visited as a parent.</p>
<p>“The frustrating thing is that MIT can’t win – either they accept all the kids with sky-high GPAs and test scores (and get called unholistic) or they accept all the kids with spark and creativity (and get called unmeritocratic).”</p>
<p>I call self congratulatory BS on this. The first half is true -they reject lots of kids with sky high scores. But to pretend that what the are really going for instead is “spark and creativity” is conceited nonsense - they are going for racial and gender balance and they can magically see “spark and creativity” mostly in those kids whose group averages are low. This actually has the opposite effect - if they are going to keep their average SAT’s up (and they need to do this for ranking purposes) then for every minority or female 700 that they take they need to take an Asian or white male 800 - so they can ill afford to let Asian males to get in on grounds of “spark and creativity”. It’s really amazing to see the willful blindness to reality that goes on in order to make AA work - I think this goes back to Feynman’s dictum that in science the first person you have to be sure you’re not fooling is yourself.</p>
<p>“StickerShock, Perhaps this is the reason M.Jones bemoaned the lack of “creativity” the lack of the “inventor child” etc. that they used to see.”</p>
<p>reflectivemom - if she thinks it is bad now just wait until the educrats get universal pre-kindergraden programs where four year olds are drilled with worksheets all day long. The educrats are convinced the reason why the product they dump on society after grade 12 stinks is because they didn’t get hold of them soon enough. It has never occurred to them that there might be something wrong with our industrial model of education.</p>
<p>But alas that is for another thread.</p>
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<p>Of course, many read the “different opinion” of Michael Kinsley. On the heels of the highly suspect “list of the 100 men and women whose power, talent or moral example is transforming the world,” all I can say is that Time is on a roll. I wonder if anyone at Time still owns a dictionary. It should be of great help to the clueless writers for looking up the definition of the terms they use ever so loosely. </p>
<p>I just did something I should have done years ago: I did cancel my subscription -even if it was a gift!</p>
<p>Stickershock:Actually more interesting is the research done at Vabnderbilt(Peabody) I believe that shows that females who are highly gifted in math still do not pursue(and are not as interested) technical fields in anywhere near the numbers as their males counterparts. If I remember correctly their followup research indicated that these females still preferred careers that were seen as more people oriented such as medicine versus math, physical sciences and engineering.</p>
<p>Percy Skivins:</p>
<p>As far as spewing complete BS you certainly top the charts! You have simply no clue about MIT’s admission policies.</p>
<p>highrlead: The idea is to get every kid ready to learn how to read. I do not know where you live but even in the jerkwater, hicksville place I am from kindergarten kids are not drilled with workesheets. Age appropriate activities that provide all kids the tools to at least be able to read and hopefully to foster learning—something that many kids are not gettting at home, seem to be a good idea to me. We are not talking about preparing the masses for MIT.</p>
<p>“This may reflect the fact that more women than men take the SAT; but this explains why second and third-tier schools may practice AA for males.”</p>
<p>Actually I believe there are a lot of first tier LACs practicing AA for males now. I also think it is the reason for some relatively large DIII sports budgets at these schools. When you start falling below a 60-40 female/male split you start having girls thinking twice about attending.</p>
<p>There are two things at work - girls doing better and better and boys doing worse and worse. The cause of one is not necessarily the cause of the other and this isn’t a zero sum game. But the bottom line is our schools are failing our boys across all races and classes but especially our minority boys.</p>
<p>hl:</p>
<p>Good points.</p>
<p>Masterof balances: “Secondly, the problem with public high schools stems only partly from the pedagogic, “behavioral” training many teachers receive today; the main problem is actually middle school. My father assures me that, in his day, actual learning took place in middle school (or junior high, as he calls it), but this is no longer the case.”</p>
<p>I do not knw how old your father is but the idea of the brain development plateauing at age 12-14 goes back to the 60’s. Unfortunately many misinterpreted the studies and decided that all pubescent, middle/junior high hormonal cases could not learn and thus social aspects were/are the focus across all groups. Recent brain research shows that these minds do need to be stimulated and exercised to develop. Furthermore, as many on this board know ,the generalities of kids not being interested in learning at this age do not hold. Schools in many areas are coming around but it takes a long time. Also being a teacher at this level is diffcult. As they say, the only good thing about teaching junior high is you never have to go to purgatory.</p>
<p>“Math 1950-2006”</p>
<p>That was pretty good coureur but if I posted it I’d have three more warnings from the moderators and five posters compare me to David Duke.</p>
<p>highlead: My son would not agree that it is the schools fault for males(especially smart ones) not wanting to achieve or excel, and priding themselves on being slackers. Might want to look at society, traditional males roles, and parenting before you blame the education sytem. That is too easy.</p>
<p>Exactly. Anyone who thinks that girls and boys are treated the same in these “egalitarian” times is willfully closing their eyes.</p>
<p>I remember when my D was young, knowing how easy it was to find “girl toys”–they were the ones in the pink aisles. </p>
<p>Well, we didn’t shop in the pink aisles, we looked for trucks and art supplies and science kits and sports equipment. Just like for her brother. And, coincidentally, we didn’t raise a priss.</p>
<p>Conversely, we expected the same sense of responsibility and work ethic in our S as we did in her. And, though he may have slacker tendencies, alas, he always did what he needed to do, cuz that’s what you do.</p>
<p>It just didn’t seem that difficult.</p>
<p>garland: But shouldn’t you have given S equal time in the pink aisles too?</p>
<p>Maybe it is the educational system to some degree and maybe it’s not. Maybe it’s “The Simpsons” and video games and maybe it’s not. The trend is undeniable, though, outside of the elite school districts and it is not getting any serious study. All any of us can say right now is how our kids responded to their school experience in one particular (our own) school district or what one kid (yours or mine or someone else’s) thinksthe cause of male lack of achievement is nationally. This doesn’t tell me anything about how public schools across the country are really serving all students and whether there’s a gender bias going against boys or not. I’d really like to see a well-designed national study on this topic. We haven’t had one yet.</p>
<p>We did, oldolddad–none! :)</p>
<p>“highrlead: The idea is to get every kid ready to learn how to read. I do not know where you live but even in the jerkwater, hicksville place I am from kindergarten kids are not drilled with workesheets.”</p>
<p>I live in the best educated county in the country and I can guarantee you they are planning on drilling four year olds with worksheets. Of course what else would you expect from the folks who designed a system where the physics teacher gets paid the same as the phys ed teacher? And no I don’t have anything at all against phys ed I just recognize it requires a different skill set.</p>
<p>They would be much better off making sure the four year old got fed and medical checkups and a sandbox to play in.</p>
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<p>My dad was in junior high starting in 1970. Yes, the idea that teenage brains couldn’t learn existed, but I don’t think that, on the whole, junior high was as much of a steaming pit as middle school is today. Recent brain research shows a lot that wasn’t known then; minds don’t stop actively developing until after high school, and brain plasticity never fully ceases. The problem in middle schools is that teachers and parents basically view it as a pointless three years spent while kids are too young to go to high school, so developing hormones are allowed to run rampant. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, basically.</p>
<p>There is also the problem of the anti-science, anti-intellect sentiment that runs through a lot of American culture, but teachers and parents shouldn’t give into it.</p>
<p>I agree with garland and oldolddad…very valid points were made on both counts. Education is not the major culprit here.</p>
<p>I think that my brother and my best friend “J” (males and high-achievers in both math/science and humanities) wouldn’t blame schools for failing to motivate guys to succeed. They have both been successful due to personal hard work, dedication, and effort – just as the girls in their respective classes have.</p>
<p>maser of balances: If I read your last post correctly I think you and I are in agreement. The recent research would not say middle schools per se are not bad but that the understanding of brain development means we have to take a hard look at teaching strategeis, methods and expectations at this level. Also we need to really look hard at teacher training for this age group of kids. Lots of work to do but not an impossble task. A paradigm shift though for many adminstrators and staff.</p>