Juana Garcia/The Cougar
Despite women being statistically more qualified than men, women are still unfairly snubbed in colleges and the job market.
Women make up over half of college students for a long time now. In fact, in 2010, The U.S. Department of Education stated women are disproportionately enrolled in higher education at every degree level. This was 11 years ago, the difference between women and other genders in colleges has only gotten larger.
Databases show Ivy League schools like Brown have a relatively higher acceptance rate for men than women. Not only do more women get into and attend college than men, but they are more successful academically. One study found that girls have higher grades by 6.3 percent.
High school boys also are more likely to get in trouble than girls with higher suspension rates. Men statistically aren’t as good of college applicants as women are.
However, many schools make it a priority to keep the gender ratio about equal, making it easier for men to get in, despite more women being better candidates. This is obviously unfair. If men aren’t as qualified as women, colleges shouldn’t lower their standards just to let them in.
But this issue doesn’t end in college. Though women are more likely to go to college despite it being harder for them to get in, they still are getting paid less than men with the current national wage gap being 18 percent. This doesn’t end at wages either.
Women are less likely to be promoted as well. The majority of new entry-level hires are women, but the amount of women decreases as one looks at higher positions, with less than half in lower-to-middle management and only 14 percent in executive positions.
These pitiful results demonstrate the ongoing prevalence of sexism in the modern day. While it may look different than the past where women rarely went to college, this exemplifies the struggle and hard work women have put in for equality.
Women work harder to get into colleges than men, yet the United States still sees a large wage gap and promotion rate. These truths prove the race for gender equality isn’t over yet. There is still a lot of progress needed to be made in academic and corporate culture in order to truly work towards ending the patriarchy.
Caitlyn Foret is a Strategic Communications freshman who can be reached at [email protected]
