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How many men attend college? It’s dropping, and that’s troubling | Opinion
Twenty years ago, David Brooks penned an essay in The Atlantic called “The Organization Kid.” It was about how the college students he encountered, particularly at elite schools, were generous and obedient and responsible, but they seemed to lack a certain moral grounding or any kind of attachment to a greater cause. He wrote: “All your life you have been pleasing your elders, performing and enjoying the hundreds of enrichment tasks that dominated your early years. You are a mentor magnet. You spent your formative years excelling in school, sports and extracurricular activities. And you have been rewarded with a place at a wonderful university filled with smart, successful, and…
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The troubling gender gap in higher education
Are America’s young men giving up on higher education? A recent Wall Street Journal report pointing out that college males now trail their female peers “by record levels” — women made up nearly 60{3132c872e6c78dc13c400a594a399f7f701f7fca090fe22c84668d12b33a9deb} of the student population in spring 2021 — has raised new concerns. Some blame male alienation and personal struggles, others campus politics. In fact, it’s a complicated issue, and it’s not always about males falling behind. But in many ways, this gender gap does point to the challenge of how to address disadvantage in a group our dominant discourse labels “privileged.” Women first began overtaking men in college 40 years ago, earning the majority of bachelor’s…