Is society short-changing boys?

A story in The Detroit News says boys are falling behind academically. Teachers expect boys to sit quietly in class like the girls, not accounting for the fact that boys and girls mature at a different pace. But, later on in high school, girls get the shaft when they are seen as unfeminine for speaking up in class. What to do?

I would have to think long and hard about sending my child of either gender to public schools. I think public schooling teaches toughness and real-world coping skills, but there are so many negatives, such as incompetent teachers and misplaced priorities. Home-schooling or private schools might be good alternatives, but who has the time or the money? Maybe single-gender elementary schools are the way to go. I think I would have benefited from that environment. Then boys can be boys and girls can be girls.

This whole topic makes me wonder when I internalized the idea that smart isn't cool for girls. I think it was at a very young age, though I can't remember a specific instance. (If you've been reading my posts, you can see that I've never gotten over this.) In elementary school I always wanted to be pretty--it was my greatest aspiration. I wanted to be a scientist--but I wanted to be pretty more. I thought of a career as something you did, but being attractive as something you were. It was only much later that I finally realized that being pretty wasn't enough--I had thought it was. It really doesn't make anything easier.

So everyone, male and female, is permanently screwed up. I guess that makes things even.