re: A Generation of American Men Give Up on College

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The article is behind a paywall

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A Generation of American Men Give Up on College: ‘I Just Feel Lost’ The number of men enrolled at two- and four-year colleges has fallen behind women by record levels, in a widening education gap across the U.S.Men are abandoning higher education in such numbers that they now trail female college students by record levels. At the close of the 2020-21 academic year, women made up 59.5% of college students, an all-time high, and men 40.5%, according to enrollment data from the National Student Clearinghouse, a nonprofit research group. U.S. colleges and universities had 1.5 million fewer students compared with five years ago, and men accounted for 71% of the decline. This education gap, which holds at both two- and four-year colleges, has been slowly widening for 40 years. The divergence increases at graduation: After six years of college, 65% of women in the U.S. who started a four-year university in 2012 received diplomas by 2018 compared with 59% of men during the same period, according to the U.S. Department of Education. In the next few years, two women will earn a college degree for every man, if the trend continues, said Douglas Shapiro, executive director of the research center at the National Student Clearinghouse. No reversal is in sight. Women increased their lead over men in college applications for the 2021-22 school year—3,805,978 to 2,815,810—by nearly a percentage point compared with the previous academic year, according to Common Application, a nonprofit that transmits applications to more than 900 schools. Women make up 49% of the college-age population in the U.S., according to the Census Bureau. “Men are falling behind remarkably fast,” said Thomas Mortenson, a senior scholar at the Pell Institute for the Study of Opportunity in Higher Education, which aims to improve educational opportunities for low-income, first-generation and disabled college students.American colleges, which are embroiled in debates over racial and gender equality, and working on ways to reduce sexual assault and harassment of women on campus, have yet to reach a consensus on what might slow the retreat of men from higher education. Some schools are quietly trying programs to enroll more men, but there is scant campus support for spending resources to boost male attendance and retention. The gender enrollment disparity among nonprofit colleges is widest at private four-year schools, where the proportion of women during the 2020-21 school year grew to an average of 61%, a record high, Clearinghouse data show. Some of the schools extend offers to a higher percentage of male applicants, trying to get a closer balance of men and women. “Is there a thumb on the scale for boys? Absolutely,” said Jennifer Delahunty, a college enrollment consultant who previously led the admissions offices at Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, and Lewis & Clark College in Portland, Ore. “The question is, is that right or wrong?” Ms. Delahunty said this kind of tacit affirmative action for boys has become “higher education’s dirty little secret,” practiced but not publicly acknowledged by many private universities where the gender balance has gone off-kilter. “It’s unfortunate that we’re not giving this issue air and sun so that we can start to address it,” she said. At Baylor University, where the undergraduate student body is 60% female, the admission rate for men last year was 7 percentage points higher than for women. Every student has to meet Baylor’s admission standards to earn admission, said Jessica King Gereghty, the school’s assistant vice president of enrollment strategy and innovation. Classes, however, are shaped to balance several variables, including gender, she said. Ms. Gereghty said she found that girls more closely attended to their college applications than boys, for instance making sure transcripts are delivered. Baylor created a “males and moms communication campaign” a few years ago to keep high-school boys on track, she said. NEWSLETTER SIGN-UP Education Select coverage from the WSJ's education bureau on the state of schools and learning, curated by bureau chief Chastity Pratt and sent to you via email. SUBSCRIBE Among the messages to mothers in the campaign, Ms. Gereghty said: “ ‘At the dinner table tonight, mom, we need you to talk about getting your high school transcripts in.’ ” Race and gender can’t be considered in admission decisions at California’s public universities. The proportion of male undergraduates at UCLA fell to 41% in the fall semester of 2020 from 45% in fall 2013. Over the same period, undergraduate enrollment expanded by nearly 3,000 students. Of those spots, nine out of 10 went to women. “We do not see male applicants being less competitive than female applicants,” UCLA Vice Provost Youlonda Copeland-Morgan said, but fewer men apply. The college gender gap cuts across race, geography and economic background. For the most part, white men—once the predominant group on American campuses—no longer hold a statistical edge in enrollment rates, said Mr. Mortenson, of the Pell Institute. Enrollment rates for poor and working-class white men are lower than those of young Black, Latino and Asian men from the same economic backgrounds, according to an analysis of census data by the Pell Institute for the Journal. Rich or Poor, Men Fall Behind College enrollment rates by family income level, October 2019

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Many are finding out that trades pay way better and you don't have to spend 4 years in school and amass significant debt to enter one. At this point you're just paying to be indoctrinated.

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This probably isn't wrong...and it's not necessarily a bad thing. I have a nephew and a brother in law. Both the same age. My BIL is currently in his 5th year of college with an unsure graduation date. I think he is majoring in one of the general business areas, but not something specific like accounting or finance.

My nephew began working a trade almost immediately upon graduating HS. 4 years later (with OT pay) he is earning nearly $100k a year. It is hard work, but he likes his job. And there is not a ton of superficial BS that goes along with it. Skill, merit and work ethic are paramount in his job and his advancement. No one is getting promoted ahead of him simply because of race or gender.

Now, the ceiling on how much my nephew can earn and how high he can advance in his career is probably capped to a large degree whereas my BIL, depending upon what job he eventually gets, is less so. But there is no guarantee my BIL is going to get a great job, with a great salary, just because he (eventually) has a college degree. On the other hand, my nephew has a job that is in no danger of being automated (at least in the foreseeable future) in a trade that isn't going to become obsolete anytime soon.

So I think the question can be asked "is college worth it?"

I'm not sure how they can be surprised by this when all you have to do is look at the landscape out there for young men.

First off; if you aren't going to school to study a STEM subject or something related to finance, simple economics should tell you that it's not worthwhile, or a bad investment. It's only exacerbated by colleges running up the costs through government intervention and the ongoing bloating of their administration. For fun look a the number of university administrators now compared to say the mid 1980's. It's mind blowing. Never mind the almost overt anti-male culture being perpetuated on campuses. Can you blame a young male for not being interested in having propaganda aimed at them daily as part of their educational experience?

Also as part of the education process; the bloat driven by administrations has expanded all types of educationals programs. Most of these programs have little to no interest from male students. So women will still flock to college to study these low ROI programs, where men simply don't find much of the curriculum relevant or even interesting. Anecdotally, even in the 90's when I was in school, I couldn't count how many programs and courses were available where I'd ask "why the hell are they teaching that". I'm sure a lot of us have shared that experience.

Second; there is a massive shortage of people for skilled labor and trade related jobs. There are high paying and plentiful jobs that appeal predominantly to men and represent a very appealing option to someone that isn't interested in leaving school close to $200k in the hole. As someone mentioned before, these are jobs that you don't have to deal with superficial and to be blunt, ridiculous corporate cultures just to do your job.

Third; the meritocracy in the jobs and the career paths that you get with a degree is dead. Chasing diversity, they've intentionally left men behind. Ironically, this has had a pretty big effect with minorities. You get left behind by the education system and once you get into the corporate space, they intentionally work to leave men behind there as well. Once you cut off pathways to success, people will find other solutions. If that solution also means that you don't have to accept massive debt and deal with a structure that has been built around quotas rather than merit, even better.

Last; the alternative educational resources have blown up over the past 20 years. If you have a very specific set of interests, there's no need for a bloated, government driven, broad university education. If you want to zero in on subject matter, it's extremely easy to get a free or very low cost education. YouTube, online certificate courses, Khan Academy, et cetera. The long view that I see is that Universities are becoming like newspapers, less and les relevant every day. There are other ways to get educated and most of them won't leave young men in massive debt and lead them to career paths where they aren't valued.

OVerall; it's a pretty simple formula for driving men away from college and into other areas of work, compounded by the fact that might actually end up being more successful in the long run.

Less about indoctrination and more about it pricing itself out of existence.

This is exactly what the country needs. Less college enrollment leads to less indoctrination.

These people have plenty of avenues for success that don’t require paying to have the way you think reshaped to fit a political agenda.

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on many of the "trades" you are using up your body rapidly. you had better become an owner/contractor by the time you are 40 because the 50's can be a slide into medical necessities.

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I can’t disagree

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Same with computer programming/coding. You ca

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Lol good luck with that. Programming well is way harder than people think. You won’t get coal miners or oil guys who have a chance. I watched over 80% of CS enrollees quit after the first and second semester, and these people weren’t stupid. I don’t know what clown courses you are watching, but you wouldn’t make it in the real world

The trades have healthy male cultures too. You don’t have to apologize for being a man, or step around your basic nature, to accommodate women.

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Men probably do realize they can go in the trades and make more money without going bankrupt.

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I no longer work on my own vehicles other than replacing the battery, taillights, headlights, etc. Just got a call from my local auto repair shop on the cost for a full brake job and front strut replacement on the wife’s Ford Edge……$1550. My guesstimate is parts are less than $500-600 and the rest is labor. Let’s see….cost for a non union mechanic with minimal benefits is probably less than $500/day, dude that owns the place has 4 bays ……he’s gotta be knocking down $400-500k gross profit a year. Yeah, screw college and all the BS that comes with it. Lol!

Just call around and get a cost estimate for a no frills picket fence, 160 linear ft…..over $5k. If I was a younger man who didn’t mind a little sweat, working in the building/construction business is the place to be right now.

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I've never thought about it before, but without subsidies, the number of women would at college would plummet.

You'd probably go back to an education system that looked like what we had, before WW2. Much smaller, and male dominated.

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I see no evidence to support this conclusion. Are women being subsidized far more than men? Minorities? Sure. But women?

The universities would surely become much cheaper and much smaller, but not male dominated.