Money: The Final Obstacle

November 22nd, 2004 · No Comments
by Booksquare

Our readers are quite familiar with our dismay about the ratio of men to women being reviewed by (and reviewing for) the The New York Times. The numbers, quite simply, do not make sense, given our general understanding of the overall number of one gender versus the other. Thus, the demise of the Women’s Review of Books is especially difficult. While it certainly made up for the NYT lack, it simply did’t have the fiscal base necessary to survive. Perhaps this could have changed, but very likely not. Another journal will emerge in another way, of that we’re sure.

On a more positive note, a front page story in yesterday’s Los Anglees Times caught our eye: apparently colleges and universities (we’re sure there’s a distinction, but, as always bow to laziness) are struggling to find male students. More women than men are attending college. Again, the ratio thing. And while we found this statement to be disturbing, though not for the usual reasons, we found the trend very interesting:

Vincent Garcia, a college counselor at the Los Angeles prep school Campbell Hall, said liberal arts colleges, especially, can be “more forgiving of the occasional B or even a C” from a boy. “Sometimes the expectation is a little bit less” than for girls, he said.

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