Women stop outperforming, outnumbering men in college

The “war on boys” crowd can rest easy today; a new study shows that the college gender gap that favored for women for so long, has stopped growing.

Men account for 43 percent of overall college enrollment and earn 43 percent of bachelor’s degrees – figures that have remained consistent since the early 2000s.

…After decades of discrimination and exclusion from many campuses, women became the majority on college campuses after 1978, an outgrowth of the women’s rights movement and a drop-off in male enrollment after the end of the Vietnam er

By 1990, the female-male breakdown was 55 percent to 45 percent. The gap widened to 57 percent to 43 percent in 2003 and has been frozen there since, according to the report.

A similar leveling off has taken place with undergraduate degrees. The last time men and women were on even footing in earning bachelor’s degrees was 1980. The gender gap kept growing until it had tilted in favor of women 57 percent to 43 percent in 2000-2001 – and has held steady there since.

As we’ve reported here before – the men who are really affected by the gender gap in college (and who continue to be) are men of color and low-income men. Not exactly the picture painted by the “boy crisis” obsessed media.

I hope this puts an end to the ridiculous media myths surrounding boys, men and education. (Women are doing well – oh noes!) But I’m not holding my breath.