Canada: What’s holding back boys’ school achievement? Blue-collar dads

Submitted by Mastodon on Wed, 2013-04-24 04:08

Article here. Excerpt:

'While men still out earn women overall – with a pay gap of 32 per cent in Canada – the gap is reversed when it comes to education, with 55 per cent of women enrolling in undergraduate degrees. The numbers for postsecondary enrolment are similar in the United States. In The Rise of Women: The Growing Gender Gap in Education and What it Means for American Schools, sociologists Thomas DiPrete and Claudia Buchmann argue that the educational achievement gap is a result of differences in how men and women have responded to changes in the wider economy. Why? It partly comes down to fathers.
...
Let’s talk about the role of the father. You find that a father who is present and who is educated has a big impact on boys’ learning. And yet study after study has shown that a mother’s education level is the key determinant of her children’s achievement. Can we actually separate each parent’s role?

It is difficult to isolate the roles of mothers and fathers because of education homogamy, well-educated people marry each other. We know that having a highly-educated father has an impact on boys. In the case of low-educated fathers, working in blue-collar jobs, we believe that part of the challenge is that boys who grow up with low-educated fathers believe that a college degree was not part of the success for dads. They have notions that to do well in school is for girls. It’s an outmoded way of thinking ...when we have a great decline in the parts of the economy where men can do well in blue-collar work or unions.'

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Comments

Again, dad's to blame. I can see some correaltion, sure. But sociologists have noted for a very long time now that most people don't "rise above" their class. If born middle-class, one is very likely to stay that way all their life. Likewise with poor and rich people. The reasons for this are multiple: Subconsciously not expecting much more materially in life than what one has, less- or more-influential social contacts already in place, etc. But notice that the article never once mentions such other factors as Title IX and anti-male college entrance discrimination, or the effects of feminized pre-collegiate classrooms (and collegiate ones, too).

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Submitted by Matt on Wed, 2013-04-24 13:32

Do you think that the authors of this article, who seem like intelligent people, do you think they know that mothers are the most influential parent in a child's life? That's because mothers spend more time with the children, not really a mystery. But we can't blame mothers. We only blame men. So the problem must be with the fathers. These apologists for feminism make me sick.

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Submitted by redwoodwriter on Thu, 2013-04-25 16:40