Redefining Gender Equity: The Disappearing Male on College Campuses
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Redefining Gender Equity: The Disappearing Male on College Campuses
- 1. The Disappearing Male on College Campuses Redefining Gender Equity Copyright 2012
- 3. 1. What percentage of males graduate from high school? 2. What percentage of today’s college students are male? 3. What percentage of bachelor’s degrees are earned by men?
- 4. 0% of high school dropouts are male www.unltd.org.uk www.flickr.com/photos/ohohdisaster
- 6. Almost half of the young men who enroll in college never finish.
- 11. 0% of boys are raised without their biological fathers
- 14. “It’s the only way I can get the kids to take notice!” Technology and the Brain
- 17. health.usnews.com “That’s part of the reason that videogames have such a powerful hold on boys: the action is constant, they can calibrate just how hard the challenges will be and, when they lose, the defeat is private” (Tyre 2006).
- 21. Classroom Experience 13% 20% Instructor Accessibility 21% 24% Amount of Time and Energy Spent 40% 35% Relationship with instructor 27% 28% Difficulty of Course Material 57% 69% Homework Assignments 42% 26% Writing Assignments 19% 24% Connections with other students in class 11% 8% Availability of Tutoring 11% 13% Previous Knowledge of Subject Matter 11% 18% Personal Interest in Subject Matter 30% 32% Outside Employment 26% 36% Involvement in Extracurricular Activities 14% 19% Family 10% 10% Male Female Factors that Undermine Success
- 22. How much I am learning 66% 67% How much I enjoy my classes 55% 60% A wide variety of classes in my major 29% 37% Instructors accessible outside of class 32% 48% Instructors who know me as an individual 35% 38% Friendships with other students 39% 27% Extracurricular activities which interest me 18% 15% Having a clear goal for career or transfer 63% 65% An advisor to help me choose classes 35% 49% Classes that fit my schedule 60% 67% Assistance with financial aid 41% 47% Having extra tutoring help available 25% 29% Assistance with family issues 10% 9% Keeping my parents happy 32% 25% Male Female Factors Keeping Students in College
- 23. 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% NECC MA State School Private 4-year Do Not Attend Did Not Answer Figure7. Male Female Where Friends Attend 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% Yes Probably No Did Not Answer Figure8. Male Female Plan to Transfer
- 24. More likely to need developmental courses Payoff is too distant Fewer than half complete developmental courses More likely to consider friendships important More likely to report plans to transfer NECC is temporary or a testing ground Spend more time working (20+ hours per week) Payoff is elusive without clear career goals Work is harder than expected Lack of identification with school
- 25. ollege Success Seminar upplemental Instruction sections ntensive classes
- 26. ollege Success Seminar upplemental Instruction sections ntensive classes
- 27. ollege Success Seminar upplemental Instruction sections ntensive classes
- 28. ollege Success Seminar upplemental Instruction sections ntensive classes
- 29. ollege Success Seminar upplemental Instruction sections ntensive classes
- 30. se a variety of evaluation options reate opportunities for risk-free failure e-introduce competition rovide options for informal networking
- 31. se a variety of evaluation options reate opportunities for risk-free failure e-introduce competition rovide options for informal networking
- 32. se a variety of evaluation options reate opportunities for risk-free failure e-introduce competition rovide options for informal networking
- 33. se a variety of evaluation options reate opportunities for risk-free failure e-introduce competition rovide options for informal networking
- 34. se a variety of evaluation options reate opportunities for risk-free failure e-introduce competition rovide options for informal networking
- 35. Contact Info: Suzanne Van Wert Northern Essex Community College svanwert@necc.mass.edu
- 36. "ADHD." Child Trends. 25 May 2009 <www.childtrendsdatabank.org>. Brandt, Michelle. "Video games activate reward regions of brain in men more than women, Stanford study finds." School of Medicine News Releases. 04 Feb. 2008. Stanford University. 17 Jan. 2009 <http://med.stanford.edu/news_releases/2008/february/videobrain.html>. Buxton, Herbert T., and Dana W. Kolpin. "Pharmaceuticals, Hormones, and Other Organic Wastewater Contaminants in U.S. Streams." USGS Science for a Changing World. June 2002. United States Geological Survey. 25 May 2009 <http://www.usgs.gov/>. Cook, Glenn. "Boys at Risk: The Gender Achievement Gap." American School Board Journal April (2006): 4-6. "Estrogen Causing Sex Changes in Wild Fish." Green Living Online. 27 May 2007. Key Publishers Inc. 16 June 2008 <http://www.greenlivingonline.com/EcoTravel/cp-1309/>. Gee, James P., and Tashia Morgridge. "Good Video Games and Good Learning." Academic Advanced Distributed Learning Co-Lab. 18 Jan. 2009 <http://www.academiccolab.org/resources/documents/Good_Learning.pdf>. Gilbert, Elizabeth. The Last American Man. New York: Viking P, 2002. Gurian, Michael, Patricia Henley, and Terry Trueman. Boys and Girls Learn Differently! : A Guide for Teachers and Parents. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2001. Hoff Sommers, Christina. The War Against Boys: How Misguided Feminism is Harming our Young Men. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2000. Jones, Robert A. "Where the Boys Aren't." National CrossTalk 13 (2005): 6-8.
- 37. King, Kelley, and Michael Gurian. "The Brain -- His and Hers." Educational Leadership 64 (2006): 59. McAvoy, Katie. "Occurrence of Estrogen in Wastewater Treatment Plant and Waste Disposal Site Water Samples." Clear Waters Issues on the Web. Fall 2008. New York Water Environment Association. 18 Jan. 2009 <http://www.nywea.org/clearwaters/08-3-fall/05-EstrogenInWastewater.pdf>. McIntosh, Molly F., and Cecilia E. Rouse. "The Other College: Retention and Completion Rates Among Two-Year College Students." Center for American Progress. 09 Feb. 2009. 22 Feb. 2009 <http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/02/two_year_colleges.html>. Newkirk, Thomas. Misreading Masculinity: Boys, Literacy, and Popular Culture. Portsmouth, NH: Heineman, 2002. Prensky, Marc. "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, Part 1." On the Horizon 9 (2001): 1-6. Prensky, Marc. "Digital Native, Digital Immigrants, Part 2: Do They Really Think Differently?" On the Horizon 9 (2001): 1-9. Raphael, Ray. The Men from the Boys: Rites of Passage in Male America. Lincoln: University of Nebraska P, 1988. Rotundo, Anthony. American Manhood : Transformations in Masculinity from the Revolution to the Modern Era. New York: Basic Books, 1993. Sax, Leonard. Boys Adrift : The Five Factors Driving the Growing Epidemic of Unmotivated Boys and Underachieving Young Men. New York: Basic Books, 2007. Sax, Linda J. The Gender Gap in College : Maximizing the Developmental Potential of Women and Men. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2006. Schneider, Barbara, and David Stevenson. The Ambitious Generation. New Haven: Yale UP, 1999.
- 38. "The State of American Manhood." Postsecondary Education Opportunity 171 (2006). Tannen, Deborah. Talking from 9 to 5. New York: William Morrow & Co., 1994. Tanner, Lindsey. "Is video-game addiction a mental disorder?" MSNBC. 22 June 2007. 17 Jan. 2009 <http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19354827/>. Tiger, Lionel. The Decline of Males. New York: Golden Books, 1999. Twenge, Jean M. Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled--and More Miserable than Ever Before. New York: Free P, 2006. Tyre, Peg. "The Trouble with Boys." Newsweek 30 Jan. 2006: 44-52. Uchitelle, Louis, and David Leonhardt. "Men Not Working and Not Wanting Just Any Job." The New York Times. 31 July 2006. 05 Sept. 2008 <http://www.nytimes.com>. Wagner, Jennifer S. "Addiction to Video Games a Growing Concern." U.S. News & World Report 07 May 2008. 17 Jan. 2009 <http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/2008/05/07/addiction-to-video-games-a-growing- concern.html>.
Editor's Notes
- Gender equity is not a term we generally associate with men. Indeed in education it is a phrase made familiar by the Title IX initiatives which responded to inequities faced by female students. Those educational reforms of the 1960’s and 70’s gave girls access to opportunities which had given boys an advantage in a broad range of careers – and they have proven to be very successful. So on one hand it may seem strange that I’m here today saying that males need help succeeding. On the other hand, I think you ’ll recognize many of the phenomena I’ll be talking about.
- I first became aware of the phenomenon after doing a program wide assessment in the Liberal Arts of writing and critical thinking. While by and large our students did well, we found when we looked at the data that women outscored men in almost every category. I was actually astonished, but as I started to do some reading and research, I found that the trend was not new; it had been happening for over 30 years.
- Take a minute and write down or make a mental note of your responses to these three questions
- Over 1 million kids drop out of school every year, about 1 every 26 seconds (Herbert NYT) 80% of them are male (Herbert) Boys earn 70 % of D ’s and F’s (Gurian) 2/3 of Special Education students are boys 70% of school suspensions are boys
- Nationwide, on average, only 65% of males graduate from high school, while 72 % of females graduate. Of those who enroll in 4 year colleges, 63% of women graduate vs. 55% of men. At NECC our graduating classes are around 2/3 women and 1/3 men. In fact, women have become so successful that today they outperform men in just about every way academic achievement can be measured, and not by just a little:
- And it’s not just that more women are coming to college in the first place. Half of the men who enroll in college never finish and those who do, earn GPA’s that, on average, are two-tenths of a point lower (on a scale of 4.0) than their female counterparts They start to disappear in the first few weeks of their first semester. And they continue to disappear along the way… However, I want to be clear: women are not taking potential degrees and careers away from men. Education and careers are not zero-sum games . Even though women do occupy more seats (and a higher percentage of seats) in colleges than in the past, the number of available spaces for college students has expanded accommodate everyone who is interested in getting an education. The Title IX reforms that enhanced girls’ education did not displace boys, and I am not suggesting, as some scholars have, that over-zealous feminism has diverted attention and resources away from males and thus caused their decline.
- There are many ways to show this particular data, but this chart, reflecting the decline in the percentage of degrees earned by men between 1976-2000 is pretty direct. Between 1976-2000 the share of bachelor ’s degrees awarded to minority men and women continued to increase. THIS IS GOOD NEWS! At the same time, the share awarded to white women has largely held steady, and the share awarded to white men has continued to decline. THIS IS NOT GOOD NEWS. Keep in mind that these are averages, and there are differences depending on race and income status. For example: The gender gap is even larger among students of color: 63% of black students are women, and only 37% are men ” (ATD Data Notes) Also, as income rises, the gender gap decreases. A 2006 study by the American Council on Education found that in high income families (more than $97,500 a year) there was no real gap. But in low income and middle class families, there is typically a 3-8 point difference in the percentage of women and men in college, depending on race. This is not a reflection on the intent of young men and women today. A number of studies have shown that “the occupational aspirations of teenage males and females are more alike today” than in previous generations. 74% of high school seniors (both male and female) say they expect to complete a college degree. (Schneider 74) So why aren ’t they? The very real waning of male interest and persistence in education is both symptomatic and predictive of some devastating socio-economic effects. In 2004 just over 26 percent of young men between the ages of 25 – 29 had completed a bachelor’s degree, and in a world that has become “flat,” they will be competing for white collar jobs with an expanding international community (Mortenson 2006, 23) And the consequences don’t just affect men. Every year now about 200,000 college educated women will be unable to find college-educated men to marry.
- Proud, self-sufficient, standing alone, rejecting the rules In truth, for boys the drift away from academic achievement begins long before high school. As a nation we’ve based our American masculine identity on that period of westward expansion, and we want to believe, against all evidence, that’s it’s still true – that we are free and wild and strong. The notion still permeates our language as we speak of men in business who are pioneers or mavericks or even cowboys; they stake their claims, have many irons in the fire and ride off into the sunset. And it is still common to admonish boys and young men to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. And it’s this way of thinking that means males hate to ask for help – even directions, much less tutoring or other kinds of support. Even as a society, while this trend has been going on for 30 years, we seem to conspire in rejecting the idea that our men need help.
- Okay, but that’s our collective iconic definition of masculinity. Who are the real men in our lives? Our cultural image of men fifty years ago was the strong and unwavering leader of the household. “Wait until your father gets home,” was a phrase meant to strike fear into the hearts of children all over America. The implication was that father would know just what to do -- whether judge, disciplinarian or problem-solver. Dad commanded respect by virtue of his position. IF THESE ARE THE IMAGES OF MEN AND FATHERHOOD FROM A PREVIOUS GENERATION, WHAT ARE THE IMAGES TODAY?
- The backlash against male privilege that began in the 70 ’s made male-bashing commonplace and acceptable. While shows like "Father Knows Best" had their own stereotypical limitations, it is hard to imagine the dependable caretaker and earnest problem-solver providing the centerpiece of today ’ s program. Commercials, too, proliferate the idea that men are hopelessly inept. Today’s dad is a bumbling, barely competent, overgrown teenager who is outsmarted and outranked by his wife and his children. In fact, Michael Kimmel in his book identifies a new stage of development between adolescence and adulthood which he coins Guyland. The old markers of adulthood – completing an education, getting married, moving out, etc, -- which used to happen over a relatively short span of time, have now been stretched over an indeterminate number of years as young people wait for the right job, the right person to reveal itself. The traditional males roles of protector and provider are fading in importance and new roles have not yet evolved. Without clear rites of passage, it’s just easier to be a sort of perpetual teenager. It’s easy to poo-pooh the notion that these television depictions of men have any real effect on boys, and that probably would be true if boys had real male role models in their lives. But the sad part is that many don’t.
- “ One of the most reliable predictors of whether a boy will succeed or fail in high school rests on a single question: does he have a man in his life to look up to? High rates of divorce and single motherhood have created a generation of fatherless boys. In every kind of neighborhood, rich or poor, an increasing number of boys -- now a startling 40% - are being raised without their biological dads…In neighborhoods where fathers are most scarce, the high school dropout rates are shocking: more than half of African-American boys who start high school don’t finish.” (Tyre) And the phenomenon is getting more prevalent. I just heard a statistic on the news claiming that more than half of all babies born to mothers under thirty are born out of wedlock. It may well be that young women don’t want to be saddled with another person to take care of. They expect that as mates, men will be a burden, not a help; that they will consume resources rather than bring them in.
- High stakes testing (the result of No Child Left Behind and other public accountability efforts) has given us new ways of measuring some kinds of academic progress—and may be significantly dampening the kind of whole brain and body learning we probably really want for our children. It is common knowledge among educators that few 5 and 6 year old boys can sit quietly while a teacher explains a lesson or asks them to read and write. And yet even with that knowledge, schools are under pressure from politicians and accrediting agencies to start kids earlier and earlier with reading and math. Kindergarten as we knew it, 2 ½ hours of learning to take turns, line up, and raise your hand before speaking, has virtually disappeared. In addition, time spent on “extraneous” things like recess, gym, and many of the fine arts - all of which allow children to move around and use their bodies and different parts of their brains to learn – is the first thing reduced when standardized test scores waver or budgets get cut. The rush to bookwork and increased seat time that is spurred by narrow definitions of academic success put boys at a disadvantage in complex ways. “In elementary school classrooms - where teachers increasingly put an emphasis on language and a premium on sitting quietly and speaking in turn -- the mismatch between boys and school can become painfully obvious. ‘Girl behavior becomes the gold standard,’ says ‘Raising Cain’ coauthor Michael Thompson. ‘Boys are treated like defective girls.’” (Tyre 2006) Not only does this influence how much boys like school from the very beginning, it is particularly detrimental because boys are conscious of their own place within any social hierarchy. High status or low status within a group may influence their level of participation and their willingness to take risks, for instance, by asking or answering questions (Tannen 1994, 26). While social order does not seem to affect girls’ levels of academic success, it does correlate with low school performance in boys. “Biologically males on the high end of the pecking order secrete less cortisol, the stress hormone. Males at the bottom end secrete more. Why is this significant? Because cortisol can invade the learning process; it forces the brain to attend to emotional and survival stress rather than intellectual learning” (Gurian and Henley 2001, 48). Furthermore, we take for granted that most teachers, over 90% in elementary schools by some estimates, are women. The most radical reformers of male education claim that schools are “feminized” places which actually discriminate against boys (Hoff Sommers 2000). Closer to the truth is probably the fact that teachers naturally use their own learning experiences to help inform their teaching. The problem is that girls and boys learn differently, so what worked for the female teacher may not be effective for her male pupils.
- Teachers have it harder and harder these days, but kids have it harder, too. Schools are under pressure to start kids earlier and earlier with reading and math; they ’re also pressured to cut down time spent on “extraneous” things like recess, gym, and many of the fine arts (music, art, drama) - all of which allow children to move around and use their bodies and different parts of their brains to learn. William Pollack, a Harvard psychologist and author of the 1998 book Real Boys , observes, “Up until fifth grade, a boy needs four to five recesses a day. What do we do if he squirms in his seat? We take away recess.” (Cook) There are physical and chemical differences in the ways males and females use their brains. For instance, girls use words and talking aloud to help them think and they enjoy problem-solving in a group where everyone is equal, while boys are better at decoding abstract symbols and tend to work silently (Gurian and Henley 2001, 45). Thus collaborative learning, which has become a mainstay in classrooms at every level, may not give boys the best opportunity to demonstrate their knowledge. In contrast, boys thrive on challenge and competition (if they have any real chance of being at the top of the hierarchy), but many teachers eschew competition, fearing that some children will suffer a loss of self-esteem. Without it, however, we lose a powerful vehicle for keeping boys engaged in their learning. In addition, the male brain is better at storing lists of information and then making quick deductive decisions (59), as is required by multiple choice tests, but modern teachers are replacing multiple choice tests with essays and projects, which favor the female propensity for language. We are not proposing that writing and critical thinking activities be dropped from our curricula, since clearly these are skills which males will need to function in society. However, teachers do need to make careful decisions about evaluation methods so that we allow both males and females equal opportunity to demonstrate their competence.
- Marc Prensky calls our current generation of learners "Digital Natives." Those of us who did not grow up steeped in technology are Digital Immigrants. The problem, he says, is that “Digital Immigrant teachers assume that learners are the same as they have always been... But that assumption is no longer valid ” (Prensky Part 1 2001, 3). “It is now clear that as a result of this ubiquitous [technological] environment and the sheer volume of their interaction with it, today’s students think and process information fundamentally differently from their predecessors” (Prensky Part 1 2001, 1). Anyone over 35 is likely to think in the sequential, linear mode which years of reading trained our brains to do. As teachers we continue to teach in ways that seem logical to us, that is, in slow, step-by-step, building block fashion. But as much as this style of teaching seems right to us, it does not resonate with our digital native students. They are accustomed to random access information on demand; they are multi-taskers who are easily bored without constant interaction. And how can we blame them when our society has created computers that respond instantly to each user’s inquiry, and video games that change course according to a player’s every move. A teacher in a traditional classroom can hardly compete with that level of interaction, and yet without it, teachers are hard-pressed to keep their students’ attention. While Prensky’s assertions apply to both males and females, because the female brain has more neural pathways connecting the left and right sides of the brain (King and Gurian 2006, 59), this greater “plasticity” gives girls an edge in adapting to various learning environments, including the holdover chalk and talk classroom.
- Another challenge to educators is the permeation of technology which has occurred in the span of just 2 generations. People in general don’t read the way they used to. Young people read even less. Girls are “slightly less likely to read in their spare time today than they were in 1980. But roughly nine out of ten boys have stopped reading altogether” (Sax 2007, 38). Tom Newkirk in his book Misreading Masculinity asked male students of various ages why they don’t read. Even very young boys pick up on cultural messages which tell them that bookishness is equivalent to being weak and friendless. Why would you read about about doing something when you can do it? They describe reading as boring. But it’s very hard for a non-reader to see the pleasure that a reader experiences. If you observe someone who is reading, it probably DOES look boring – the person is sitting silent and stock still for long periods of time. It was around the turn of the century, the time of efficiency and assembly lines, that sustained silent reading became the norm – because it is more efficient way to read. Before that it wasn’t necessarily a solitary activity. Families sat around and read aloud to each other, there were public readings – it could be a communal activity. Teens today spend about 20% of their waking time alone – about 3 ½ hours a day – because they have fewer siblings and single parents that must work. But while we have lost the communal nature of reading, the early American moralistic view of it persists. Reading is so often portrayed as something you should do, something that’s good for you – like dieting or exercising. ‘If you read the classics you will become a better human being.’ And certainly reading for reflection is not a bad thing, but Unless you can derive some kind of pleasure from it, you’re just not going to be able to keep it up.
- [Story about asking Conrad, “Do you read for pleasure,” and getting response, “Nothing longer than a fortune cookie.”] By the time they graduate from college, most students “have spent less than 5,000 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours playing video games (not to mention 20,000 hours watching TV)” (Prensky Part 1 2001, 1)
- So, if they’re not reading, what are they doing? Anyone read Malcolm Gladwell ’s new book Outliers ? In it, he explains how some of the world’s most successful people—from professional hockey players to the Beatles to Bill Gates—became successful. One advantage he describes is the “10,000 Hour Rule.” Basically, he suggests that if you have a natural talent for something, then get to practice it for at least 10,000 hours—whether it’s hockey, computer programming or rock and roll—you’ll become the best in the world (or at least better than most of us…) So what are young people—particularly young boys—becoming the best in the world at when they play video games for more than 10,000 hours through middle school, high school and college? In fact, video games may pose a special concern, and not just for the usual worries about violence. An overwhelming majority of children and teens play video games as a form of entertainment, but they are exceptionally popular with adolescent boys, who spend an average of 13 hours per week chasing, shooting, crashing and burning in the virtual world (Sax 2007, 58). One reason video games are so appealing to this group is the ease with which a gamer can achieve power and victory. As mentioned earlier, boys have a need to strive for the top of the hierarchy; if they aren’t making it in their real lives, they may be more successful in their fantasy lives. “That’s part of the reason that videogames have such a powerful hold on boys: the action is constant, they can calibrate just how hard the challenges will be and, when they lose, the defeat is private” (Tyre 2006).
- Perhaps more important, new evidence suggests a physiological link as well. Researchers at Stanford University found that playing video games stimulates the region of the brain in both genders which is “typically associated with reward and addiction. Male brains, however, showed much greater activation” (Brandt). It is no surprise, then, that males get hooked on video games. “Up to 90 percent of American youngsters play video games and as many as 15 percent of them - more than 5 million kids - may be addicted, according to data cited in the AMA council’s report” (Tanner 2007). A similar report from Iowa State University claims, “about 8.5 percent of 8-to-18-year-old gamers can be considered pathologically addicted, and nearly one quarter of young people - more males than females - admit they've felt addicted” (Wagner 2008). With or without a physiological compulsion to play, large amounts of time spent on video games is time not spent learning important things for academic or real world success. While immediate feedback and knowledge on demand are video game principles which may very well enhance learning, the commercial products available today distract rather than help boys succeed in school.
- Many schools, of course, have incorporated computers into their curriculum, and a few educators are even heralding the use of video games. James Gee has carefully analyzed the positive learning principles utilized by many popular products which respond to the individual moves made by a player, and contends that schools could teach this generation of learners more effectively and efficiently by using the principles of good video games as a tool. Risk-taking: Good video games lower the consequences of failure; players can start from the last-saved game when they fail. Players are thereby encouraged to take risks, explore, and try new things. In fact, in a game, failure is a good thing. Facing a “boss” (that is, a new level of problems), the player uses initial failures as ways to find the boss’s pattern and to gain feedback about the progress being made. School too often allows much less space for risk, exploration, and failure. Performance before Competence Good video games operate by a principle just the reverse of most schools: performance before competence (Cazden 1981). Players can perform before they are competent, supported by the design of the game, the “smart tools” that the game offers, and often, too, the support of other, more advanced players (in multiplayer games, in chat rooms, or standing there in the living room). Language acquisition itself works this way. However, schools frequently do not. They often demand that students gain competence through reading texts before they can perform in the domain that they are learning.
- In order to try and understand some of the things we might be able to impact, I decided to ask the students themselves. All of it is self-reporting, of course, which means its reliability is based on the students ’ perceptions of what they need, etc. In a survey conducted on over 500 English Comp 1 students in the fall of 2008, we asked which classroom activities were most useful, which factors played an important role in keeping them in college, and which factors they thought contributed most to their success in college. Surprisingly -- or not -- males and females reported very little difference in their answers to these questions. (instructor demonstration followed by hands on practice was most useful, followed by lecture BTW) Personal interest in the subject matter was the only factor that stood out as more important to women than to men. In small percentages, homework was identified as important by more women than men, as was the availability of tutoring -- which may mean that if women recognize the importance to these things, they actually seek out tutoring and do the homework -- which in turn leads to success.
- Indeed, when we asked this question conversely (which factors undermine your success), 42 % of men vs 26% of women identified homework as a factor. I don ’t think it comes as a surprise to any teacher or any parent of male children that boys are less likely than girls to do their homework. The other difference which may be significant is that males do not consider that the difficulty of the course material will impact their success with it. Other research has in fact documented that males tend to overestimate their abilities, both in the workplace and in school. That, coupled with the fact that males will do lot to avoid being at the low end of any social hierarchy, may explain how the cycle of sinking in college repeats what happens to boys in the earliest years in school. This time it starts when they don’t do the homework because they think it’s unimportant and because they think they know enough without it. Thus their grade on the next test or assignment is not great, so they begin to dislike the class. This leads to not showing up or not investing oneself in the class because failing is only psychologically tolerable if you can at least say to yourself that you didn’t try. Etc.
- We also asked the students to rank which factors were important in keeping them in college. The differences highlighted here seem to indicate that women are more aware that people at the college can help them. The only factor on the list that is more important to males than females is having friendships with other students. That surprised me me, but I don’t know why it should. We see them wanting to be connected all the time – on their cell phones, texting, etc. I mentioned earlier that they spend 20% of their waking time alone – and less than 10% of their waking time with friends. Yet adolescents report having a higher sense of self-esteem and feeling happier, more powerful and more motivated when they are with their friends.
- These next two charts could shed a little more light on the question of male psychic investment. On the previous slide we saw that men report friendships as the single most important factor keeping them in college. Here, when asked where their friends attend, we see that males are less likely than females to have friends who attend NECC or any Massachusetts state school; now it ’s not clear whether this means their high school friends went elsewhere or whether it means they have not met people at the school whom they would classify as friends. Either way it speaks to a more tenuous connection to the student body. Males are also more likely to express their plans to transfer somewhere else. If they see NECC as “temporary,” why invest yourself? {FLIP BACK TO PREVIOUS SLIDE} The last slide also showed that Almost 2/3 of both males and females identified “having a clear goal for career or transfer” as important or very important in keeping them in school. For those who don’t have one, the payoffs of staying in school may be less clear and less likely to balance out the costs (financial and psychic). Interestingly, about 1/3 of males vs. 1/4 of females said that keeping their parents happy was an important or very important factor in keeping them in school, which again speaks to their own psychic investment.
- This brings us to the issue of psychic investment. I don ’t know if any of you remember a study that was done at least 20 years ago by the college board, where they looked for predictors of success in college. Of course, SAT scores were one predictor, although not the highest. Number of bathrooms in the house was another good predictor, but that speaks to social class. But the best predictor was whether or not the student was psychically invested in the institution and/or their education. For many of our students the investment requires a big leap. I recently read an article where the authors, Molly McIntosh and Cecelia Rouse, applied Becker’s model of human capital to college retention rates, and it made a lot of sense to me. Essentially, the theory of human capital asserts that we are constantly performing miniature cost-benefit analyses on all sorts of tasks and undertakings, but not necessarily in monetary terms. For many of our students, the payoff for psychic investment is unclear, too high, or too distant. At NECC males are 35% of student population and 43% of developmental students (and they are overrepresented in the percentage of students who place into developmental courses and do not take them). Needing developmental courses pushes back the goal of career or transfer, often for at least a year. Now I am not saying that students should skip developmental courses, just trying to understand the various dynamics that increase the psychic costs specifically for males. Again, it ’s tough enough to hang in there for the extra time if you DO have a clear goal; if you don’t, you might just wonder if it’s worth it. Only 46% of males successfully complete developmental writing, 44% developmental math compared to 61% and 60% for females. Ironic since we saw earlier saw earlier that fewer males than females considered the difficulty of course material was likely to be a problem. For women, we might say forewarned is forearmed. The surprise difficulty of course material may exact a psychic cost on the men. As we saw in the last slide, more men report that friendships are important and that they do not have a lot of friends at NECC. Thus they have less opportunity to feel any sense of group identification with the college. This may also explain why male athletes have a higher retention rate than other groups of male students -- they have a sense of identity with the group and with the college. Learning Communities, too, seem to have a positive effect on retention rates among all students -- perhaps again because of the sense of belonging to a group. Talked about transfer on last slide. In addition to being a temporary stop, we saw that more males had friends who did not attend college at all. For them, NECC may be a testing ground; not sure whether they are “college material,” they give it a try here (whether to keep their parents happy or some other reason) -- but this, too, reflects a rather tenuous connection. Males are more likely to spend 20 or more hours per week working, and are more likely to be financing their own education, so you ’d think they’d be invested because of that, they would be more invested -- literally -- in their education. We did not ask how many of these students were full or part time, but if someone is working 20 or more hours per week and going to school part-time, the payoff really gets pushed way off into the future. In addition, we have to factor in what Becker calls “opportunity cost;” that is, time spent NOT working (and on school instead) is perceived as a loss, and thus without a clear understanding of the benefits of an education, of realizing a specific dream, etc., the cost becomes higher than the benefit. The authors also found that increasing grant aid by $1000 increased college attendance by 5% - further supporting the idea that lowering the actual investment helps retain students.
- These are some of the ways NECC has tried to respond to what we know about male (and female) students. A College Success Seminar has been under construction and refinement for about 3 years now. It literally requires students to meet their advisor and come up with relevant questions to ask him or her. It provides StrengthsQuest, which forces them to consider their own strengths (and perhaps weaknesses). Many CSS classes are also Learning Communities with other first year courses, and LCs seem to increase students’ sense of belonging.
- Designated sections of certain courses have any accompanying study hour with a student leader (we used to call these recitations when I was in college). One of our professors has been studying the impact of SI on student performance and retention by looking at stats for regular classes, SI classes and more specifically for male hispanic students who have male hispanic student leaders. He is also considering experimenting with gender specific SI. Few students will sign up for formal mentors, but we may be able to provide them this way.
- Taking a cue from what we know about the differences in male and female brains, Use a variety of evaluation options in class so that everyone has the opportunity to demonstrate their knowledge. From their infatuation with video games, we can Create opportunities for risk-free failure. They learn by trial and error, not the linear way we did. yet How often do we really allow students to have a free test run where we actually give them meaningful feedback before they perform for a grade? Socially we know boys thrive on competition when they feel they have a real shot at success. I’m not talking about creating a harshly agonistic atmosphere – just the occasional debate with a real prize. At NECC the Business dept. sponsors a Business Plan competition – the winner gets a laptop computer. Build mentors into the curriculum. SI sections with hispanic male SI leaders had much higher retention rates for hispanic males non-SI sections of the same course. If our culture doesn’t support a positive image of males interested in school, provide an example they can get to know. Provide opportunities for informal networking or ways that males can make friends, find a niche and a sense of belonging. Running club, noon basketball
- From their infatuation with video games, we can Create opportunities for risk-free failure. They learn by trial and error, not the linear way we did. yet How often do we really allow students to have a free test run where we actually give them meaningful feedback before they perform for a grade?
- Socially we know boys thrive on competition when they feel they have a real shot at success. I’m not talking about creating a harshly agonistic atmosphere – just the occasional debate with a real prize. At NECC the Business dept. sponsors a Business Plan competition – the winner gets a laptop computer.
- Provide opportunities for informal networking or ways that males can make friends, find a niche and a sense of belonging. Running club, noon basketball
- They have never lived in a society which valued duty – they don’t see hard work as a virtue of its own. Males are more likely to do homework if they know why it’s important for them. They have also grown up with less free time than any generation before. They have always had their lives scheduled for them – soccer practice, then baseball, cub scouts, etc.