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Are Public Schools In The US Biased Against Males?

Is there a bias against boys in the American educational system?


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Dragonfly

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Is there a bias against boys in the American educational system?
 
Honestly wouldn't shock me, but that has to do with the overall incompetency of teachers today.

Hell, I bet in every high school classroom, two or three kids are smarter than the teacher in an overall measure.

I used to correct my algebra teacher's mistakes.
 
The guys who wrote Freakonomics have an interesting theory about why teachers were far better "back in the day" than they are now.
 
Is it possible that perhaps girls are just getting smarter? Raising the bar?
 
Might just as easily say teachers discriminate and are biased against females. Math education is a clear example.
 
Why Boys Struggle with School - FamilyEducation.com


Another question I have is this: is anything that different now as opposed to 50 years ago?

Were boys better behaved back then? Less physical? Easier to manage?
Weren't the majority of teachers in the 50's and 60's female?

Is this perhaps more about how boys are handled outside of school?

Less play outside, more video and computer games inside?
 

I voted no. I didn't read your link. If I could? I'd change my vote having had a brief opportunity to think about it. I think many referrals for ADHD testing come from the school system. Boys are more than twice as likely as girls to be so diagnosed. Boys are just filled with kinetic energy they've got to throw off. I think teachers are more inclined to refer boys than girls because boys are harder to manage when there's no one at home making rules. So, let's dope 'em up!
 
Boys mature later than girls, tend to be more physically active than girls, and more likely to act out. Boys should start school about six months later than girls do, but, of course, that's politically impossible.

Little boys and little girls are not the same. The problem is, we have to treat them as if they were.
 
Why Boys Struggle with School - FamilyEducation.com


Another question I have is this: is anything that different now as opposed to 50 years ago?

Were boys better behaved back then? Less physical? Easier to manage?
Weren't the majority of teachers in the 50's and 60's female?

Is this perhaps more about how boys are handled outside of school?

Less play outside, more video and computer games inside?

Yes, and it's not just the change in activity, but as you said, how they are handled at home, discipline. Talk back to your teacher in my day and you'd be paddled at school, when you got home and most likely the next time your grandparents visited just for good measure. Make sure you got the point. There was more tolerance of boyish behavior, but the lines were there and in bold ink. Sassing the teacher was a rubicon one did not cross.
 
I voted no. I didn't read your link. If I could? I'd change my vote having had a brief opportunity to think about it. I think many referrals for ADHD testing come from the school system. Boys are more than twice as likely as girls to be so diagnosed. Boys are just filled with kinetic energy they've got to throw off. I think teachers are more inclined to refer boys than girls because boys are harder to manage when there's no one at home making rules. So, let's dope 'em up!

Who makes the decision to put boys on medication?

Parents, or teachers?

Teachers may refer, complain, suggest, or even insist, but the choice to medicate does not lie with the teacher or school.

Does it?
 
Boys mature later than girls, tend to be more physically active than girls, and more likely to act out. Boys should start school about six months later than girls do, but, of course, that's politically impossible.

Little boys and little girls are not the same. The problem is, we have to treat them as if they were.

Can't we segregate? Boys in one classroom, girls in another?

Why can't we start them at different ages?

If you have a boy, and you desire success, wouldn't you do whatever is needed to help the odds of success?
 
Naturally I can't comment on American schools, but as I remember my time in school, much depended on the respective teacher. We had a feminist female teacher who definitely discriminated against teenager boys. We had a physics teacher who would make even sexist jokes about girls not getting natural sciences in class and accordingly grade the girls.

But in general, I'm not sure if I'd call it "discrimination", I'd say it's true that schools had relatively few tolerance for lack of discipline, and that was indeed bigger problem for boys than for girls. If that's because schools today don't respect the natural needs of boys, or if boys today, unlike a few generations ago, are undisciplined brats because of bad parenting, is a question I cannot answer.
 
Can't we segregate? Boys in one classroom, girls in another?

Why can't we start them at different ages?

If you have a boy, and you desire success, wouldn't you do whatever is needed to help the odds of success?

Hothouse flowers don't survive long after they leave the greenhouse. Children will have to deal with a mixed sex environment their entire lives. The time for them to gain the tools to learn in such an environment is early on in the process.
 
I don't think that there is intentional bias, but the schools do need to do more to deal with some kid's need for physical activity and their short attention spans, characteristics usually associated with boys. Teaching kids to focus on the instructor and the learning process should be an an ongoing process. It is unrealistic to think that kindergarten is enough to prepare all kids to sit and focus for hours every day. We should also reconsider whether that is a healthy and realistic expectation, considering the obesity problem, changing work environments and other issues.

Today's teachers compete with all the other people and media that are available to entertain kids. Dull teachers are no longer acceptable. They need to use videos, computers, peer teaching/learning and physical activity to keep kids engaged, while simultaneously developing the kid's ability to stay focused on instruction and learning.
 
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Who makes the decision to put boys on medication?

Parents, or teachers?

Teachers may refer, complain, suggest, or even insist, but the choice to medicate does not lie with the teacher or school.

Does it?

The decision lies with the parents, not the schools.

The over medication of hyper active kids is part and parcel with our tendency to over medicate in general. There's a pill for everything. Most of them don't work, or have horrible side effects.

Some kids do benefit, but only a very few.

Oh, and if the parents play their cards right, the kids diagnosed with ADHD just might qualify for SS disability! Really!
 
Boys mature later than girls, tend to be more physically active than girls, and more likely to act out. Boys should start school about six months later than girls do, but, of course, that's politically impossible.

Little boys and little girls are not the same. The problem is, we have to treat them as if they were.

Those tendencies aren't strictly by gender, kids should be evaluated individually to determine the best way to teach them..
 
Those tendencies aren't strictly by gender, kids should be evaluated individually to determine the best way to teach them..

That would be best. Give the children a maturity test on entering Kindergarten, and assign the less mature ones to a pre K. That would be a real boon to a lot of kids. I can guarantee you that the pre K would be mostly boys, however.
 
From my personal experience both genders are capable of being complete idiots just the guys tend to do more stupid stuff. Though it usually tends to be the guys who see themselves a hillbillies and drive around in overly large trucks and do incredibly stupid things. It ins't because the educational system is biased, it is because of society. It is more acceptable for a guy to be a complete idiot and a hillbilly than it is for a girl, they are just idiots and so are most of their parents.
 
Who makes the decision to put boys on medication?

Parents, or teachers?

Teachers may refer, complain, suggest, or even insist, but the choice to medicate does not lie with the teacher or school.

Does it?

Oh, but the parents are often given incentive to allow such a diagnosis and treatment. What follows is subjective information.

I have extended family who adopted a child. He was diagnosed as ADHD at about age 3 after being evaluated (in this case) at the parents' request. As a result of that diagnosis and their decision to medicate him, his preschool is subsidized by the government; he is transported to and from preschool in a private van. This is HUGE. This child is "borderline autistic" because he likes to turn his bike over and spin one of the wheels every once in a while. This child is perfectly normal. It's damned sad.

School systems receive extra money based on the number of students qualified under Section 504.

As always, follow the money.
 
Is there a bias against boys in the American educational system?

Hmm. It's complicated. A significant source of the problem is the narcissistic parenting that has emerged in recent decades that enables "boys to be boys." Teachers are left to fend for themselves, and they are typically portrayed as the real villains. Honestly, if we as a society could constructively deal with poor behavior in the classroom--which disproportionately comes from boys--then I think that this change alone would improve our struggling schools.

Lori Day: Why Boys Are Failing in an Educational System Stacked Against Them


So I ask:

1) Should we segregate boys and girls into different schools, or at least separate classrooms?

I don't know. This has been tried with mixed results. Doing this gives some students a safe space from the opposite sex, but how does it affect LGBT students? How does it affect cis, straight students that are picked on a lot more by their own gender? They have needs, too.

2) Should boys start school at an older age than girls? If girls start first grade at 6 years old - should boys be made to wait until 7?

Uhh, I'd rather not have huge boys in the same grade as petite girls, thank you.

3) Do boys require male teachers?

No, they don't. Otherwise this leads to a slippery slope of "everyone should be with those that are most familiar to them."
 
Being in high school myself, I don't feel like there is any bias towards me.
 
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