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CardinalFang
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 04:32 am |
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Boys are underrepresented in college these days. I hear that colleges don't want their male enrollment to slip below, say, 40%. In your experience, comparing your child's acceptances to his/her classmates, how much advantage does a boy get over a comparable girl in admission?
On edit: I see that Carolyn already covered this topic over in the What does it take to get in? folder, in a post entitled something like The Truth about Gender.
Last edited on Tue Mar 18th, 2008 04:48 am by CardinalFang
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outwest
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 04:54 pm |
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As the mother of three girls this has been an annoying reality with each college search. I think the smaller schools have more trouble catching boys then the large sporty schools. I also think the public schools have about 50:50, don't they? It has been a little frustrating knowing my girls have to be much better then a comparable boy to get in, but life isn't fair and that's the way it is.
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Wstrdg
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 05:04 pm |
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Even the large public univs are heavier with females. Think about it: their mandate is to admit the best applicants from their state, not to balance enrollment in terms of gender.
My son's res hall usually tries to balance each suite of males with suite of females, per wing. But this year, some wings have two female suites, because there are more girls than guys. And this is a heavy sci/engineering school.
It kind of steams me when I see the high school sponsoring programs "to get girls interested in science." Currently, fewer of our boys are graduating UC-eligible than are our girls. Fewer of our boys are graduating, period. Another example of the administration being a decade or more behind the times.
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CardinalFang
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 05:04 pm |
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After my initial post, I read Carolyn's thread. In it, she claims that boys don't get an admission boost, at least in the top few tiers of college. Bad news for Fang Jr, good news for outwest's daughters, I guess.
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outwest
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 05:15 pm |
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The social aspects of not having an even distribution of boys and girls isn't great either, unless you are a boy.
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CarolynLawrence
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 06:29 pm |
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It really depends on the individual college, Cardinal Fang. Some colleges really strive to keep that gender ratio as equal as possible, giving males (or females as the case may be!) a leg up. But other colleges don't work as hard at it because they have other priorities in admissions, such as making sure they get enough kids near full pay to balance the books. And, just because the admit rate is higher for one sex over another, it doesn't tell you if that is because the sex with the higher admit rate got in because of their sex, or because they were better qualified applicants. The only way to really make that determination is to have the data on GPA and test scores of admitted (not enrolled!) students by gender, and, unfortunately, very few schools narrow it down that way. A general rule of thumb, however, is that when you start to see the male-female ratio heading over 40-60, there will be more pressure on admissions to even things out with a boost to one gender. But, this is mostly true at private U's -- publics tend to be more numbers driven, and many aren't technically supposed to consider things like gender or race.
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ellenrch
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Posted: Tue Mar 18th, 2008 07:47 pm |
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I checked the Common Data Set for one university my son applied to because girls outnumbered boys by a noticeable amount (I don't remember the percentages). Sure enough, the percentage of female applicants was almost exactly the same as the percentage of females admitted, so there is no attempt to boost the number of boys. My son's high school is 65-35 girls-boys, and I wish it were more balanced. I think it's a girl-oriented learning environment, and that works to the disadvantage of some boys. College should be different, I hope. (It sure is interesting being the feminist mom of an only son. My perspective has changed a bit  )
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CardinalFang
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Posted: Wed Mar 19th, 2008 12:20 am |
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| Ellen, another feminist mom of an only son here. It does change one's perspective. When I was pregnant, I thought I wanted a girl, but I'm kind of a tomboy. Now I think I'm a better mother for a son than for a daughter.
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mathmom
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Posted: Wed Mar 19th, 2008 03:37 am |
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While boys may have a slight advantage at LACs, don't forget girls may have an advantage at many engineering/science oriented schools if they are willing to apply. We have a friend whose daughter is getting a very nice scholarhip at RPI.
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