Gender Discrimination at HC?

These days men just go to Holy Cross to meet Ms. Right and get their Mr. Degree.

Any of the guys on any varsity teams?

I don’t know many of the students but one I do know in the picture is a senior captain on the ladies soccer team.

Curious if the demands on varsity athletes’ time inhibits the ability to be in this society. No recognizable football or men’s basketball players here yet we know we have some academic all Patriot League players especially on the football team.

The PL academic standards may be lower than this society and this may well be the best of the best. The one young lady I know, her mother and grandmother seemed to be more proud of her being in this honor society than her varsity soccer career.

OK, I didn't know I might be quizzed on this subject ( ) but my recollection was that I was told either by the honoree herself or her mother that the floor for admission was not top 15% but rather the top 4% academically. That it was a unique amount sticks in my brain. Now, since this is a Jesuit honor, is it possible that it is the top 4% over all Jesuit colleges and universities and because Holy Cross is such a prestigious school that the top 15% of Crusader students are within the top 4% of all Jesuit schools? 

For more information:


en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpha_Sigma_Nu

Of note, this doesn't clarify the 15% vs. 4% but does state:

Ahhh, you've squared the circle (or whatever the expression is). Thanks. Sounds like the 15% are potential nominees and the 4% (or 5%) are the winners. But impressive nonetheless. 

Edit: Duh. My powers of observation are shot! Not only did the honoree or mother tell me 4%, it says it in the photo caption!

Correct. Plus, as has been noted, it is also more likely that a higher percentage of females fulfill the service requirement.

As to this particular selection process for Alpha Sigma Nu, we don't have enough information about the pool of eligible students, the number of students from that group who applied, the records of each student etc to draw any conclusion one way or the other about any type of discrimination.  Sometimes, however, statistics are quite helpful as indirect proof of both disparate treatment and disparate impact discrimination.

Imagine a  large public company is taken private by a wealthy,  but somewhat eccentric, billionaire.  He decides  his company is bloated and that he wants to lay off 1000 of his 3000 engineers who are 49% men, 49% women, and 2% non binary persons.  Assume for the sake of this exercise that length of service is not considered and that the groups each have an equivalent percentage of employees whose work is of A quality, B quality, and C quality.  Assume also that the average male employee is 15 years older than the average female or non binary employee.

After the process is completed, the company has laid off 800 men, 140 women, and all 60 non binary persons.  

This result suggests that the employer might be targeting older and/or male workers and non binary ones. The proof of the latter is stronger than the proof of the former but there is enough there to look further as to whether the employer was out to get certain classes of workers.  On the other hand, the employer might have been acting in good faith but applied standards which unintentionally resulted in this result, .i.e. a disparate impact.  As you can imagine there is quite a bit more to this discussion but there is nothing wrong with starting with what appears to be a skewed outcome to see if there is something wrong going on. As employers rarely write down or say out loud any more that they are engaged in illegal discrimination, properly developed statistics are an important tool in identifying discrimination.

( I am not suggesting that any eccentric billionaire currently in the news is engaging in illegal discrimination.  While he may be getting himself in trouble related to some of his labor practices, I have seen no such allegation of this type of behavior.)

Pride—

I don’t disagree about boys in school. My observation of my five kids and their friends is that it happens in middle school and that for many kids, it lasts. I think one way to address it would be to do away with honors classes in the freshman year of high school. Let all the kids come in at the same place and let the high school teachers sort them out. I would do this, in part, by getting almost every kid through Algebra 1 in 8th grade.

I also don’t like the team concept in middle school where kids stay with a group and have all of the same teachers. It promotes group think among the faculty.

Clowning aside, I don;t think 92 really thought there was discrimination at HC.  Just a statistical anomaly, which, as many have pointed out, could have various root causes

My own observation (kind of similar) is that the girls take schools and grades more seriously than the boys and at a younger age. [Not all girls and not all boys, of course.] And this “advantage” opens a gap that doesn’t really close thru high school. So the girls dominate the ‘academic top 10’ at high school graduation and continue (in many cases) this pattern of academic achievement going forward. One of many reasons my two daughters did far better than I did in HS and college 😊
Almost everything associated with ‘middle school theory’ is bonkers so I’m with you on that too.

It's emotional maturity.

Women physically mature MUCH earlier than men. Example: I didnt play a varsity sport until junior year of HS. My wife was a 5 year varsity STARTER in multiple sports. Those who follow HS sports know that its very common for women to be stars by freshman year if not sooner, whereas it takes a freak of nature male to be a major contributor at the varsity level as a frosh.

But academically and as far as mentally becoming an adult, women are definutely ahead of men into their mid-20's.

Gender discrimination in education is why women academically outperform men at at Holy Cross? In regards to Alpha Sigma Nu. Could be. Maybe the assumption amongst a critical mass of profs is that men are less serious about their studies. Institutional sexism?