Does Liberty and Justice for All Include Our Boys?

Submitted by Mastodon on Fri, 2013-07-05 19:09

Article here. Excerpt:

'As our nation rounds the corner on another birthday and continues its long history of trying to figure out exactly what it means to be a nation of liberty and justice for all, it's a good time to look at an increasingly "lost" group in our culture: our sons.

First, some fast facts about our boys. According to New York Times bestselling author Michael Gurian:

  • For every 100 girls suspended from elementary and secondary school, 250 boys are suspended.
  • For every 100 girls diagnosed with a learning disorder, 276 boys are so diagnosed.
  • For every 100 girls expelled from school, 355 boys are expelled.

...
In the 1960s and '70s, when we sensed that our girls were not keeping up with our boys in education, we rolled up our collective sleeves and did something about it, to the tune of Title IX and $100 million from the U.S. government. Backed by the women's movement, not only did we get our girls caught up, but by the 1980s, they sailed past our boys and have now left them in the dust. To this day, even though our girls are light years ahead of our boys, the storyline is still about how our girls are behind, facts to the contrary.

Richard Whitmire notes that boys are struggling in most Western countries. But here's his telling observation: What makes the United States unique is its relative indifference to the issue. Here, the U.S. Department of Education has yet to launch a single probe into the problem. Not one dollar from the U.S. government has been spent on getting our boys caught up. No national movement focuses on our boys (or our men).
...
Where will these men work? What women will want to marry them? Where will these men find significance and meaning in life? What will society do with an increasing number of undereducated men, or men who don't fit the profile for the emerging jobs of the 21st century?

If indeed we are a nation of liberty and justice for all, then it's time for us as a nation to invest in our boys on a national scale. To get them caught up in school. To call out the noble in them. To give them a vision of how they, along with their sisters, can change the world.'

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Comments

Schools, boys and education are a very complicated problem. Schools are run by unions, they have no competition and no independent system of checks and balances to keep them honest and fair. The bigger problems they find, then more they take on and the more money they receive. I am surprised they have not jumped on the "boy crisis" and demanded more tax dollars to "fix" the issue. To me, schools are a bottomless welfare pit. (I say welfare because they are funded by tax dollars and they have taken over the raising of children)

Then I thought of the federal tax dollars they receive when a boy is diagnosed with a disability, the schools receive more federal money for their ADD students compared to a students without a "disabilities". So they have a financial benefit to suggest to parents to get their children diagnosed with ADD/or ADHD. During ADD diagnosis teachers are called upon to submit a report to the doctor (it is really all the doctor goes on) to start getting meds. When a student has any type of disability including ADD, they then have a team of government employed specialists assigned to them at the school. The paid bureaucracy grows.

and suspending boys?.. how nice that they can suspend which basically allows them to collect a paycheck for educating a student, while kicking the student out of class. And parents have little recourse or options. Now if schools had competition, then parents could decide to send their child elsewhere.

Anyway, schools are a non-regulated, bottomless pit of funding for bureaucracy. I think they have not tried to fix the boy problem because they get more money when boys are diagnosed as ADD/ADHD and it creates more jobs for them.

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Submitted by Kris on Sat, 2013-07-06 18:14