The boys just aren't going to college

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that men really only have 2 options: make it in society or don't make it. The "make its" go to college, good $$ salary, are able to compete for good spouses. The "don't make its" end up with no jobs, low salaries, dating issues because potential spouses don't want to make double or triple what their husbands make, prison. There isn't a great middle ground.

Women have more options and ability to succeed in society. Men don't care that they make more money than their wives. Men are okay having a SAHM who is great with children. Women's only value isn't our earning potential the way it seems to be for men. Part of this is also that men haven't found a good way to step it up at home. My dh is a fantastic 50% partner at home, but he couldn't do it all. He'd be lousy as a SAHD and couldn't do all of the chores himself like many women do.

I agree that men's roles in our current society are so much more fixed. There's more flexibility for women.

PP here. Yes that's what I'm trying to say. I see it with my friends that I grew up in. Quite a few of them are great guys, but couldn't hack it in a corporate structure and kinda got left behind. They live in their parents' basements and didn't marry. Not bad guys, but they couldn't find a path

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

DP. I don't think the PP meant to judge the use of medication or suggest that it is unnecessary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are Asian and I have a son with ADHD and a daughter without. I completely reject any notion that boys have it harder overall in their lives. Yes, my son has it terribly hard at school, and yes, it's harder for him to apply to college, because of his race and because of his grades impacted by his ADHD. But male privilege is such that he will be "saved" in his career by being male and given the benefit of the doubt, whereas my daughter, despite great intelligence and functional skills, will always need to prove herself at every rung of the ladder.

So take this recent data in perspective.

See, that's how we got here, and seems it will get much worse (with the above thinking currently prevalent). What the heck's male privilege anyway? Anecdotally at my fortune 500 workplace the majority of senior execs are female and have been so over the last decade. At my top 20 college the STEM program I graduated from is now 'intentionally' held at 50/50 percentage breakdown between men & women with some years favoring more women than men. I've seen the HS credentials of lots of the women being admitted and you can tell they've been systematically exposed to more STEM programs (girls who code, kode with klossy, numerous university sponsored 'women in engineering' programs) burnishing their resumes than the men. Also many more 'math support' groups for young women both in HS and within the colleges. Those programs specifically exclude male students and this is fueling my alma mater's engineering school (and likely other schools as well) now having to artificially maintain a semblance of gender balance by 'putting a thumb on the scale' to ensure men get to attend. View from the STEM perspective.

I have worked in IT for 25 years and your experience is not at all typical. Or at least it's not driving the workforce. More than 80 percent of the resumes I get for junior developers and other entry level positions are from men. For senior positions it's closer to 98 percent male.

I came here to write the exact same thing but PP beat me to it. The overwhelming majority of people I work with in hands-on, hard core tech projects are men. I've can't recall working with more than a handful female developers other than those I hired. Sure, there are women doing front end UX stuff and project management, but the people grinding out code are mostly male in my experience. Of course there ARE female developers working at top companies, but in the markets I work in (government and non-silicon valley business), it's mostly men.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We are Asian and I have a son with ADHD and a daughter without. I completely reject any notion that boys have it harder overall in their lives. Yes, my son has it terribly hard at school, and yes, it's harder for him to apply to college, because of his race and because of his grades impacted by his ADHD. But male privilege is such that he will be "saved" in his career by being male and given the benefit of the doubt, whereas my daughter, despite great intelligence and functional skills, will always need to prove herself at every rung of the ladder.

So take this recent data in perspective.

See, that's how we got here, and seems it will get much worse (with the above thinking currently prevalent). What the heck's male privilege anyway? Anecdotally at my fortune 500 workplace the majority of senior execs are female and have been so over the last decade. At my top 20 college the STEM program I graduated from is now 'intentionally' held at 50/50 percentage breakdown between men & women with some years favoring more women than men. I've seen the HS credentials of lots of the women being admitted and you can tell they've been systematically exposed to more STEM programs (girls who code, kode with klossy, numerous university sponsored 'women in engineering' programs) burnishing their resumes than the men. Also many more 'math support' groups for young women both in HS and within the colleges. Those programs specifically exclude male students and this is fueling my alma mater's engineering school (and likely other schools as well) now having to artificially maintain a semblance of gender balance by 'putting a thumb on the scale' to ensure men get to attend. View from the STEM perspective. [/quote

I have worked in IT for 25 years and your experience is not at all typical. Or at least it's not driving the workforce. More than 80 percent of the resumes I get for junior developers and other entry level positions are from men. For senior positions it's closer to 98 percent male.

I came here to write the exact same thing but PP beat me to it. The overwhelming majority of people I work with in hands-on, hard core tech projects are men. I've can't recall working with more than a handful female developers other than those I hired. Sure, there are women doing front end UX stuff and project management, but the people grinding out code are mostly male in my experience. Of course there ARE female developers working at top companies, but in the markets I work in (government and non-silicon valley business), it's mostly men.

But engineering goes way beyond computer engineering/coding/developers. There is also civil, environmental, chemical, mechanical, biomedical, electrical, and so on. And some of those tilt heavily towards women these days.

[Anonymous]

Out of curiosity and to get some broader context--anyone here do military recruiting/familiar with it...how's military recruiting doing recently?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With higher paying trade work being more male dominated is it any wonder that fewer of them are going to college?

Spoiler alert: The guy making $150k as a plumber is in a better position than the woman making $75k as an exec assistant with loan debt.

I have a number of friends in the trades. Talk to them when they're mid 40s and have worked 20-25 years already. The work is physically grinding and takes a toll. One injury and you're out of work for weeks or months.

Reminds me of a guy I was talking to last week, who did refrigeration and HVAC. He had to quit because he was on call 24/7 to fix commercial refrig units and body couldn't handle getting calls at 3am to drive out and fix some broken ice cream freezer at Giant. He was in his early 50s.

This is my cousin reL HVAC. The money is great, but the work is hard and takes a physical toll. He invested in other things in order to not be so heavily leveraged in the business if something happens to him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

DP. I don't think the PP meant to judge the use of medication or suggest that it is unnecessary.

DP. Agree, and I have a medicated son. I think that if you have to medicate significant number of make children in order to get them through th education system, that is a screaming red alarm that something is wrong with the education system. It is okay to acknowledge that the number of medicated boys is staggering. This is a fact.

[Anonymous]

* male children

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

DP. I don't think the PP meant to judge the use of medication or suggest that it is unnecessary.

DP. Yes, the PP absolutely meant to judge and suggest that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The pandemic is speeding up the mass disappearance of men from college
The decline in enrollment has been seven times as steep among men as among women

https://hechingerreport.org/the-pandemic-is-speeding-up-the-mass-disappearance-of-men-from-college/

Implication - it is going to be harder for the girls to get in.

Maybe we shouldn't worry about balance and let the person with the better grades etc get in.

[Anonymous]

what are "better" grades? each student applying has their story about where they went to HS and what challenges they had to overcome. Why are the students have to spend s much time on essays and recommendations and tests and activities if all the matters is one, out of context, end of year grade?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

I'm the PP and I did not mean to suggest - and I'm sorry if I sounded as if I were - that medication isn't a really good solution for some kids - necessary, life-changing, good! I was just bemoaning how elementary school seems to be so sedentary and punitive these days, leading to little active kids - often boys, often boys of color - getting flagged as disruptive and "bad" and getting put on medication to make them more compliant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Just one person’s observations:

I have 2 boys and 1 girl. All college educated with science degrees and all in various forms of health and tech. The youngest is currently a college junior. I think mostly it has to do with family expectations and helping them find a college setting in which they can thrive (not necessarily a top 20 school or whatever). Their friends I’ve seen falter had parents that were too hung up in pushing for collée and career, prestige, salary, etc.

I have 3 children, all boys. One is headed to college this fall (he's in at his first choice), one sophomore, one middle school. My sophomore likely will not go to college. We have been requesting accommodations from the school for 4 years to address his inattentive ADHD and executive function issues - the school has refused. DS has ended up with depression due to the school's refusal. We, his parents, have to put his mental health first. Unfortunately, the school refuses to educate him. Our family expectation was that all of our children would go to college. We didn't anticipate that the school system would fail one of our children so completely and dramatically.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Agree that girls can have ADHD too - but I do think that the numbers of medicated boys these days is staggering and really sad.

You think that based on your appalling ignorance . Please STFU. Parents of kids who have moderate to severe ADHD will tell you that medication has, in many cases, save their kids' lives. ADHD has serious social and emotional consequences for kids, including lots of behaviors that cause their peers and teachers to judge them really negatively, not to mention academic problems. People with untreated ADHD have higher rates of suicide, alcoholsim, and drug abuse.

The anxiety that my SECOND GRADER suffered due to not being able to control his outbursts, to sit still or to focus on school work due to to ADHD were horrible. Low dose medication on school days transformed his interaction with teachers and peers, but more importantly, it totally changed his experience of school. As he got older, taking an even lower dose, short acting med on weekends when he had lots of homework prevented him from spiraling into an anxiety meltdown whenever he had more than 20 minutes of homework. Meds allowed him to focus, start getting some work done and realize that an assignment that his ADHD brain told him would take several days actually would take like a half hour.

I'm the PP and I did not mean to suggest - and I'm sorry if I sounded as if I were - that medication isn't a really good solution for some kids - necessary, life-changing, good! I was just bemoaning how elementary school seems to be so sedentary and punitive these days, leading to little active kids - often boys, often boys of color - getting flagged as disruptive and "bad" and getting put on medication to make them more compliant.

+1. All kids are different. There are boys and girls with ADHD. However, if you have a spirited, active boy, particularly a boy of color, you will see that that boy get labeled as a bad kid and bad student, and that message gets internalized. What was once a lively spirit requires medication or gets squelched quickly as negative feedback accumulates. As an adult with ADHD, even with medication I have to adopt strategies to work efficiently and stay focused, and none of them involve sitting on my butt with only a 20 minute break at lunch.