Is MCPS systemically Biased against Boys?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

NP. You couldn’t answer PP’s argument, so you’re trying to have it both ways. If there are “brain differences between biological sexes,” then why should we encourage boys to go into education?

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

And some of us acknowledge the spectrum of differences within a biological sex are greater than the difference between the biological sexes.

That is clearly false.

Signed,

Scientist

DP and a neuroscientist. Why do you think this statement is false? It fits with the neurocognitive data I've seen.

PP says she’s a scientist though!

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I was dumbfounded when I volunteered in my kids' MCPS classroom that teachers reward students who can sit still on the classroom rug as early as K. All the boys fidgeted, all the girls got the rewards. As they got older, there were various extracurricular enrichment geared toward girls - not just Girls on the Run but also arts programs where boys were not permitted to join. It blew my mind that public schools could discriminate against one gender. I asked the art teacher at our MCPS elementary school, who held afterschool art classes that were only open to girls, why - she said boys rarely signed up because they were too busy with sports.

I have 2 boys, one of whom loves sports and the other who is totally indifferent. An afterschool art class or casual running club would have been a godsend especially as they got ready for the social pressures around middle school. It should be illegal to offer preferential activities that discriminate by gender.

Like any other program in community, including religious and ethnic groups, Girls on the Run can rent use of MCPS facilities. Do you complain when Korean Sunday Schools are held in our middle schools?

+1 bashing Girls on the Run is absolutely ridiculous and those that do lose all credibility. When it comes to sports there is no dearth of programs for boys. FFS in MCPS TWO of the sports played mostly by girls are focused on cheering on the boys' teams. GTFOOH.

In 6th grade there are no MCPS sports yet, but Girls on the Run is advertised by our MS, with no equivalent program for boys. I understand that there are reasons behind this, but it's still a fact. (That is kind of upsetting to my son - he's no very sporty though does swimming and would love to run/jog - I'm hoping he'll enjoy cross-country next year.)

Good for MCPS. That's the age when many girls drop out of sports. Boys also drop out but not in such large numbers. I assure you there are plenty of sports programs available in your community for boys in 6th grade. I hear that your son would love to run, guess what, a lot of girls would love to play sports that are not available to them either. Stop bashing a program that is doing a lot of good.

I'm a NP. I'm not sure that anyone is bashing Girls on the Run; just pointing out that the equivalent program for boys might night exist at every school. You approve the point but referring to "sports programs available in the community for boys" which are not the same as after school programs available in the actual school building and, therefore more accessible than community programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.

People are absolutely bashing it. On poster said it "pissed them off," another thought it was disappointing that the program existed only for girls and compared it to "Caucasians on the run," at least one wanted to force them to accept boys or stop advertising at schools.

If people wanted to support boys, they'd build up the programs supporting boys, instead they're focusing on tearing down programs for girls. I think that speaks a lot to where their actual priorities are.

+1 this

Some of y'all are selfish a-holes

On the other hand, the question was is the system biased against boys. If you are telling people they should start their own programs to support boys, doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why does BBC Baseball have priority use for fields when it mostly serves boys? Doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why are most MCPS high school softball fields inferior to the baseball fields in terms of dugouts, signage, turf on the field, score boards, and signage around the field? What about all the facilities girls sports have compared to male sports? There are many inequities in MCPS athletics but mostly against girls.

The dollars go to the sports that bring in the dollars. Football concessions outweighs softball concessions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

And some of us acknowledge the spectrum of differences within a biological sex are greater than the difference between the biological sexes.

That is clearly false.

Signed,

Scientist

DP and a neuroscientist. Why do you think this statement is false? It fits with the neurocognitive data I've seen.

PP says she’s a scientist though!

I'm not the pp you're trying to argue against but your argument is illogical. Stating there's a brain difference between sexes doesn't in any way make an argument for men not wanting to teach or being good at it. You're ridiculous and I'm embarrassed for you to have made such a stunningly ridiculous fallacy.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I was dumbfounded when I volunteered in my kids' MCPS classroom that teachers reward students who can sit still on the classroom rug as early as K. All the boys fidgeted, all the girls got the rewards. As they got older, there were various extracurricular enrichment geared toward girls - not just Girls on the Run but also arts programs where boys were not permitted to join. It blew my mind that public schools could discriminate against one gender. I asked the art teacher at our MCPS elementary school, who held afterschool art classes that were only open to girls, why - she said boys rarely signed up because they were too busy with sports.

I have 2 boys, one of whom loves sports and the other who is totally indifferent. An afterschool art class or casual running club would have been a godsend especially as they got ready for the social pressures around middle school. It should be illegal to offer preferential activities that discriminate by gender.

Like any other program in community, including religious and ethnic groups, Girls on the Run can rent use of MCPS facilities. Do you complain when Korean Sunday Schools are held in our middle schools?

+1 bashing Girls on the Run is absolutely ridiculous and those that do lose all credibility. When it comes to sports there is no dearth of programs for boys. FFS in MCPS TWO of the sports played mostly by girls are focused on cheering on the boys' teams. GTFOOH.

In 6th grade there are no MCPS sports yet, but Girls on the Run is advertised by our MS, with no equivalent program for boys. I understand that there are reasons behind this, but it's still a fact. (That is kind of upsetting to my son - he's no very sporty though does swimming and would love to run/jog - I'm hoping he'll enjoy cross-country next year.)

Good for MCPS. That's the age when many girls drop out of sports. Boys also drop out but not in such large numbers. I assure you there are plenty of sports programs available in your community for boys in 6th grade. I hear that your son would love to run, guess what, a lot of girls would love to play sports that are not available to them either. Stop bashing a program that is doing a lot of good.

I'm a NP. I'm not sure that anyone is bashing Girls on the Run; just pointing out that the equivalent program for boys might night exist at every school. You approve the point but referring to "sports programs available in the community for boys" which are not the same as after school programs available in the actual school building and, therefore more accessible than community programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.

People are absolutely bashing it. On poster said it "pissed them off," another thought it was disappointing that the program existed only for girls and compared it to "Caucasians on the run," at least one wanted to force them to accept boys or stop advertising at schools.

If people wanted to support boys, they'd build up the programs supporting boys, instead they're focusing on tearing down programs for girls. I think that speaks a lot to where their actual priorities are.

+1 this

Some of y'all are selfish a-holes

On the other hand, the question was is the system biased against boys. If you are telling people they should start their own programs to support boys, doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why does BBC Baseball have priority use for fields when it mostly serves boys? Doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why are most MCPS high school softball fields inferior to the baseball fields in terms of dugouts, signage, turf on the field, score boards, and signage around the field? What about all the facilities girls sports have compared to male sports? There are many inequities in MCPS athletics but mostly against girls.

You’re wrong.

Have you been to the high school baseball fields in this county? They are pretty terrible. Come to Einstein and see how the field never drains properly and there are no lights, plus trash everywhere. Ask any baseball player about the fields - sometimes barely even mowed. No better than the softball fields - which I will agree are also terrible.

Not an inequity. This county just simply does a poor job of taking care of both baseball and softball fields.

The inequity is on full display at Churchill, WJ, BCC, and Whitman. One could also argue that there’s inequities in the facilities among schools in MCPS.[/quote

Add RM to your list. The baseball field got fancy lights and the girls softball team plays in the dark. ]

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was dumbfounded when I volunteered in my kids' MCPS classroom that teachers reward students who can sit still on the classroom rug as early as K. All the boys fidgeted, all the girls got the rewards. As they got older, there were various extracurricular enrichment geared toward girls - not just Girls on the Run but also arts programs where boys were not permitted to join. It blew my mind that public schools could discriminate against one gender. I asked the art teacher at our MCPS elementary school, who held afterschool art classes that were only open to girls, why - she said boys rarely signed up because they were too busy with sports.

I have 2 boys, one of whom loves sports and the other who is totally indifferent. An afterschool art class or casual running club would have been a godsend especially as they got ready for the social pressures around middle school. It should be illegal to offer preferential activities that discriminate by gender.

Like any other program in community, including religious and ethnic groups, Girls on the Run can rent use of MCPS facilities. Do you complain when Korean Sunday Schools are held in our middle schools?

+1 bashing Girls on the Run is absolutely ridiculous and those that do lose all credibility. When it comes to sports there is no dearth of programs for boys. FFS in MCPS TWO of the sports played mostly by girls are focused on cheering on the boys' teams. GTFOOH.

In 6th grade there are no MCPS sports yet, but Girls on the Run is advertised by our MS, with no equivalent program for boys. I understand that there are reasons behind this, but it's still a fact. (That is kind of upsetting to my son - he's no very sporty though does swimming and would love to run/jog - I'm hoping he'll enjoy cross-country next year.)

Good for MCPS. That's the age when many girls drop out of sports. Boys also drop out but not in such large numbers. I assure you there are plenty of sports programs available in your community for boys in 6th grade. I hear that your son would love to run, guess what, a lot of girls would love to play sports that are not available to them either. Stop bashing a program that is doing a lot of good.

I'm a NP. I'm not sure that anyone is bashing Girls on the Run; just pointing out that the equivalent program for boys might night exist at every school. You approve the point but referring to "sports programs available in the community for boys" which are not the same as after school programs available in the actual school building and, therefore more accessible than community programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.

People are absolutely bashing it. On poster said it "pissed them off," another thought it was disappointing that the program existed only for girls and compared it to "Caucasians on the run," at least one wanted to force them to accept boys or stop advertising at schools.

If people wanted to support boys, they'd build up the programs supporting boys, instead they're focusing on tearing down programs for girls. I think that speaks a lot to where their actual priorities are.

+1 this

Some of y'all are selfish a-holes

On the other hand, the question was is the system biased against boys. If you are telling people they should start their own programs to support boys, doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why does BBC Baseball have priority use for fields when it mostly serves boys? Doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why are most MCPS high school softball fields inferior to the baseball fields in terms of dugouts, signage, turf on the field, score boards, and signage around the field? What about all the facilities girls sports have compared to male sports? There are many inequities in MCPS athletics but mostly against girls.

You’re wrong.

Have you been to the high school baseball fields in this county? They are pretty terrible. Come to Einstein and see how the field never drains properly and there are no lights, plus trash everywhere. Ask any baseball player about the fields - sometimes barely even mowed. No better than the softball fields - which I will agree are also terrible.

Not an inequity. This county just simply does a poor job of taking care of both baseball and softball fields.

The inequity is on full display at Churchill, WJ, BCC, and Whitman. One could also argue that there’s inequities in the facilities among schools in MCPS.

Also note who the cheerleaders cheer for, which games get announced during announcements, who gets prime practice times and fields. But sure, Girls on the Run is the problem

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up people, it's 2022, there is no such thing as boys and girls anymore.

Fair point.

Wtf is Girls on the Run? A transphobic sexist Russian lobby?

Right? What would MCPS and Girls on the Run do if a boy asked to join. I’m pretty sure they would have to allow it. Or would the boy have to claim he was trans?

I used to work at an elementary school where we had both a girls on the run club and some kind of boys running club

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wake up people, it's 2022, there is no such thing as boys and girls anymore.

Fair point.

Wtf is Girls on the Run? A transphobic sexist Russian lobby?

Right? What would MCPS and Girls on the Run do if a boy asked to join. I’m pretty sure they would have to allow it. Or would the boy have to claim he was trans?

I used to work at an elementary school where we had both a girls on the run club and some kind of boys running club

Our former elementary school had a single running club that was open to any kid to join.

[Anonymous]

If your boy is in the office they did something wrong.

I have four mine never made it to the "office" never once called in for my kids behavior.

Mine are far from perfect however no boys will be boys at my house.

We had our fair share of crap teachers however we also gave our sons the tools to work with them or even change class periods if the teacher sucked.

Schools aren't perfect neither are people.

I am not judging if your kids did something wrong that is on them.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

NP. You couldn’t answer PP’s argument, so you’re trying to have it both ways. If there are “brain differences between biological sexes,” then why should we encourage boys to go into education?

No, I am saying that women "on average" are less likely to be successful in STEM due to brain differences, so I do not attribute women dropping out as due to discrimination against girls, therefore we do not need the entire education system to be tilted toward helping girls succeed in STEM. Follow along...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

NP. You couldn’t answer PP’s argument, so you’re trying to have it both ways. If there are “brain differences between biological sexes,” then why should we encourage boys to go into education?

No, I am saying that women "on average" are less likely to be successful in STEM due to brain differences, so I do not attribute women dropping out as due to discrimination against girls, therefore we do not need the entire education system to be tilted toward helping girls succeed in STEM. Follow along...

Source?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was dumbfounded when I volunteered in my kids' MCPS classroom that teachers reward students who can sit still on the classroom rug as early as K. All the boys fidgeted, all the girls got the rewards. As they got older, there were various extracurricular enrichment geared toward girls - not just Girls on the Run but also arts programs where boys were not permitted to join. It blew my mind that public schools could discriminate against one gender. I asked the art teacher at our MCPS elementary school, who held afterschool art classes that were only open to girls, why - she said boys rarely signed up because they were too busy with sports.

I have 2 boys, one of whom loves sports and the other who is totally indifferent. An afterschool art class or casual running club would have been a godsend especially as they got ready for the social pressures around middle school. It should be illegal to offer preferential activities that discriminate by gender.

Like any other program in community, including religious and ethnic groups, Girls on the Run can rent use of MCPS facilities. Do you complain when Korean Sunday Schools are held in our middle schools?

+1 bashing Girls on the Run is absolutely ridiculous and those that do lose all credibility. When it comes to sports there is no dearth of programs for boys. FFS in MCPS TWO of the sports played mostly by girls are focused on cheering on the boys' teams. GTFOOH.

In 6th grade there are no MCPS sports yet, but Girls on the Run is advertised by our MS, with no equivalent program for boys. I understand that there are reasons behind this, but it's still a fact. (That is kind of upsetting to my son - he's no very sporty though does swimming and would love to run/jog - I'm hoping he'll enjoy cross-country next year.)

Good for MCPS. That's the age when many girls drop out of sports. Boys also drop out but not in such large numbers. I assure you there are plenty of sports programs available in your community for boys in 6th grade. I hear that your son would love to run, guess what, a lot of girls would love to play sports that are not available to them either. Stop bashing a program that is doing a lot of good.

I'm a NP. I'm not sure that anyone is bashing Girls on the Run; just pointing out that the equivalent program for boys might night exist at every school. You approve the point but referring to "sports programs available in the community for boys" which are not the same as after school programs available in the actual school building and, therefore more accessible than community programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.

People are absolutely bashing it. On poster said it "pissed them off," another thought it was disappointing that the program existed only for girls and compared it to "Caucasians on the run," at least one wanted to force them to accept boys or stop advertising at schools.

If people wanted to support boys, they'd build up the programs supporting boys, instead they're focusing on tearing down programs for girls. I think that speaks a lot to where their actual priorities are.

+1 this

Some of y'all are selfish a-holes

On the other hand, the question was is the system biased against boys. If you are telling people they should start their own programs to support boys, doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

PP, but not the one you're directly responding to, but no, I don't. Girls on the Run exists because parents and people in the community saw a need for it and built it. Let Me Run exists because the parents saw a need for it and built it. They're both equally able to access school resources and equally dependent on parents stepping up to make sure that the program is there. There's a discrepancy between how many locations each program has, (Let Me Run has 11 sites in Montgomery County, Girls on the Run has 66), but that's down to how many parents volunteer. If fewer parents see a need for a program for boys, how does that suggest a problem?

Where are the 11 sites for let me run program in Montgomery county? I only see Kensington choice, 1 location in the county.

I have both a boy and a girl. In our elementary school, girl cam join on the Run at 3rd grade, and there is no other sports or similar activity for boy in our elementary school.

Kensington is the location it gives for Montgomery County, but if you click it goes through to this (https://montgomerycounty.letmerun.org/teams) which has 11 teams, not counting schools that have separate 3 and 4th/5th teams twice. There are also lots of sports activities for boys in Montgomery County, so I'm not sure what you mean. Girls on the Run isn't paid for by the school or anything, they use school facilities, like a lot of sports teams. There's plenty of sports out there for 3rd grade boys.

NP. Thank you for clarifying. I don't understand all of the outrage about Girls on the Run and think the PPs have misunderstood the schools' actual role with it. MCPS is not providing coaches or directly facilitating Girls on the Run, they are simply allowing the families that volunteer to lead a group to rent MCPS facilities. If PPs want their sons to join a running group, then set up a Let Me Run group in your neighborhood. That's what the Girls on the Run Participants did. And if PPs aren't interested in running, there are plenty of other volunteer-run, recreational-level sports available in the county.

Part of the problem is this - at our ES, the coaches for Girls on the Run are teachers from our ES.

Versus for other after-school activities where private companies bring in outside teachers or coaches for soccer or foreign language, etc.

Girls on the Run uses teachers from the school.

They are VOLUNTEERS. They are not on the books for MCPS from 7:30 to 8:15 (or whatever). During that timeframe, before they are "on the books" for MCPS, they are just community members who are volunteering for a parent-run initiative.

It would be different if they were compensated by MCPS for that time, but they are not.

Okay. Why are you yelling at me?

Just pointing out that because it’s teachers, the program feels like it is more associated with the school. Versus an after school program that brings in coaches from outside the school.

So, basically the girls have this opportunity to hang out with / run with / spend time with / build community with their female teachers outside of school whereas the boys do not.

This reminds me of a tradition that we're trying to phase out in corporate America -- after-work happy hours They aren't mandatory, but the chance to network with the higher-ups is really valuable, but many women had family commitments and couldn't make it. Now we're trying to do those as a brown bag lunch event instead.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:I was dumbfounded when I volunteered in my kids' MCPS classroom that teachers reward students who can sit still on the classroom rug as early as K. All the boys fidgeted, all the girls got the rewards. As they got older, there were various extracurricular enrichment geared toward girls - not just Girls on the Run but also arts programs where boys were not permitted to join. It blew my mind that public schools could discriminate against one gender. I asked the art teacher at our MCPS elementary school, who held afterschool art classes that were only open to girls, why - she said boys rarely signed up because they were too busy with sports.

I have 2 boys, one of whom loves sports and the other who is totally indifferent. An afterschool art class or casual running club would have been a godsend especially as they got ready for the social pressures around middle school. It should be illegal to offer preferential activities that discriminate by gender.

Like any other program in community, including religious and ethnic groups, Girls on the Run can rent use of MCPS facilities. Do you complain when Korean Sunday Schools are held in our middle schools?

+1 bashing Girls on the Run is absolutely ridiculous and those that do lose all credibility. When it comes to sports there is no dearth of programs for boys. FFS in MCPS TWO of the sports played mostly by girls are focused on cheering on the boys' teams. GTFOOH.

In 6th grade there are no MCPS sports yet, but Girls on the Run is advertised by our MS, with no equivalent program for boys. I understand that there are reasons behind this, but it's still a fact. (That is kind of upsetting to my son - he's no very sporty though does swimming and would love to run/jog - I'm hoping he'll enjoy cross-country next year.)

Good for MCPS. That's the age when many girls drop out of sports. Boys also drop out but not in such large numbers. I assure you there are plenty of sports programs available in your community for boys in 6th grade. I hear that your son would love to run, guess what, a lot of girls would love to play sports that are not available to them either. Stop bashing a program that is doing a lot of good.

I'm a NP. I'm not sure that anyone is bashing Girls on the Run; just pointing out that the equivalent program for boys might night exist at every school. You approve the point but referring to "sports programs available in the community for boys" which are not the same as after school programs available in the actual school building and, therefore more accessible than community programs that occur in the evenings and on weekends.

People are absolutely bashing it. On poster said it "pissed them off," another thought it was disappointing that the program existed only for girls and compared it to "Caucasians on the run," at least one wanted to force them to accept boys or stop advertising at schools.

If people wanted to support boys, they'd build up the programs supporting boys, instead they're focusing on tearing down programs for girls. I think that speaks a lot to where their actual priorities are.

+1 this

Some of y'all are selfish a-holes

On the other hand, the question was is the system biased against boys. If you are telling people they should start their own programs to support boys, doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why does BBC Baseball have priority use for fields when it mostly serves boys? Doesn't that suggest there is a problem?

Why are most MCPS high school softball fields inferior to the baseball fields in terms of dugouts, signage, turf on the field, score boards, and signage around the field? What about all the facilities girls sports have compared to male sports? There are many inequities in MCPS athletics but mostly against girls.

The dollars go to the sports that bring in the dollars. Football concessions outweighs softball concessions.

That argument would mean MCPS violates Title IX which is discrimination on the basis of sex. Title IX was written fifty years ago so girls could have equal opportunities including athletic opportunities in public schools.

[Anonymous]

Wasn’t there a social emotion component to Girls on the Run? Encouraging and empowering girls to be leaders? No different than Asian Alliance and African American clubs.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:Yep we've seen it too. Also in our Bethesda ES, there are no male teachers and no male adminstrators. The only males working in the building are the building services and janitorial staff.

I've seen little attempts by MCPS to address the massive gender imbalance in hiring.

It's not an MCPS imbalance in hiring. It's a gender imbalance in the number of education majors who are women vs. men. Teaching has always traditionally been seen as a woman's career (I bet teachers would be paid much better if it was a male-dominated field!). The way to address the gender imbalance in schools is to encourage more boys to go into teaching, which won't happen until we change societal expectations of men as providers and women as nurturers.

We heard the same thing in tech -- not enough "pipeline" of women so that's why STEM fields had a huge gender imbalance. So, we focused on ensuring gender balance at the college level, which is why the STEM fields at many universities are now evenly balanced in terms of students studying. The result is more women in STEM fields, since more women are being educated in those fields. We made STEM "cool" even at the grade school level, which is great.

But... no such efforts when the gender imbalance is the other way. Again, we're failing our boys.

The problem with your comparison with STEM is that girls/women have traditionally been seen as not being good enough for these professions, while teaching was seen as not good enough for boys/men - because it doesn't pay enough, it's "easy," etc. (in both cases, boys/men are seen as superior).

Excuses, excuses. We heard a million reasons why women couldn't enter field X and they proved them wrong. Why don't we apply the same to boys?

You realize that women still drop out of STEM careers at shockingly high rates? The problem of women in STEM is far from over. Do not be so smug. You have nothing to be smug about.

Some of us acknowledge brain differences between biological sexes, rather than blame some bogeyman for our preference toward the verbal.

NP. You couldn’t answer PP’s argument, so you’re trying to have it both ways. If there are “brain differences between biological sexes,” then why should we encourage boys to go into education?

No, I am saying that women "on average" are less likely to be successful in STEM due to brain differences, so I do not attribute women dropping out as due to discrimination against girls, therefore we do not need the entire education system to be tilted toward helping girls succeed in STEM. Follow along...

https://cerebromente.org.br/n11/mente/eisntein/cerebro-homens.html
Source?

You'll have to go back to 2014 and prior to find some real studies.