YES
Thomas G. Mortenson:
We must address the underlying causes

During the last three decades, females have made extraordinary progress in high school graduation rates, in college participation rates for those who graduate from high school, and in college completion rates. Although women today make up about 49 percent of the college-age population, they earn nearly 56 percent of the bachelor's degrees. Thirty years ago, women earned only 43 percent of the bachelor's degrees awarded in the U.S. These achievements are to be applauded and encouraged.

By contrast, males have made little or no progress in high school graduation, college participation and college completion rates during this same period. At the margin of college admissions, males appear dazed and confused. A comparison of male and females responses to UCLA's annual "The American Freshman" survey shows that male college freshmen are more likely than females to spend time exercising, watching TV, partying and playing video games. They also are less likely than freshman women to have participated in student clubs and groups, do housework or provide childcare, do volunteer work or study.

In response, college admissions officers are weighing programs designed to increase undergraduate male enrollments. While the institutions stop short of calling this effort "affirmative action," their approach would rely upon some sort of preference system. This idea is ill-advised. Not only does it denigrate the efforts and achievements of women in the past 30 years, it obscures the much larger issues all men face in adapting to a rapidly changing world. Addressing the changes males need to make if they are to engage life's opportunities as successfully as females have done should be the real agenda. Women have been adapting; now it's time for boys and men to do it.

The achievements of young women in school should not be compromised to accommodate unfocused, uncommitted, poorly prepared boys coming out of high school.

What really needs attention is why the boys are leaving high school in this pathetic condition. The male gender is in serious trouble in K-12 education, at home, in the workplace and in civic roles. Women are thriving in these worlds, and males are faltering. We should address these issues causally--not symptomatically through affirmative action in college admissions--if we want to include males in constructive roles in this brave new world we are building every day.

NO
Jacqueline E. King:
The gender gap is only part of a larger problem

Although women do earn the majority of bachelor's degrees, and some types of colleges are finding it difficult to recruit male students, there is not an educational "crisis" among American men in general. The data reveal that the state of gender equity varies significantly by age, race/ethnicity and socioeconomic status. In particular, African-American, Hispanic, and low-income young men lag behind their female peers in terms of educational attainment, but men and women from these groups are far outpaced by white and middle-class men and women.

These conditions are not new. African-American, Hispanic, and low-income students have lagged behind their peers for years. In addition, the growing gender gap within these groups has been well documented. Why are we paying attention to the academic success of men now? The answer may be that the public has come to believe that academic underachievement is shifting from a problem that only afflicts poor and minority young men to a more widespread issue that also affects white, middle-class males.

The data refute this supposition. There is little evidence to suggest that white, middle-class males are falling behind their female peers. Fifty-six percent of all undergraduates are female, but this disparity is due to minority women, who are enrolling in larger numbers, and older women, who may not have had the opportunity to attend or complete college immediately following high school and are returning to higher education now. Among traditional-aged, white undergraduates, the gender split is 51 percent female, 49 percent male.

Among traditional-aged students, socioeconomic status has a much stronger effect on college attendance rates than either race/ethnicity or gender. Students from families in the bottom quintile on socioeconomic status are half as likely to enter college as students from the top quintile (39 percent vs. 80 percent).

There is an educational gender gap, especially among minorities and low-income students (the gender split among traditional-age African-American undergraduates is 63 percent female, 37 percent male). However, this gap is dwarfed by the educational chasms related to race/ethnicity and social class. Therein lies the "crisis." Educators, policymakers and the media should concentrate their time, resources and attention on the students who are in greatest danger of being left behind and avoid becoming distracted by crises that may have little basis in fact.