U.S. culture discouraging girl mathematicians, study says

Even the most talented mathematics students are being discouraged from advancing in the field thanks to cultural attitudes in the United States, according to a report published today in the Notices of the American Mathematical Society.

The study examined participants in top mathematics competitions for students and found that the majority of the top young mathematicians in the country – especially female students – were born in other countries.

Many girls with extremely high aptitude for math exist, concluded Janet Mertz, a professor of oncology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the senior author of the study, but they're rarely identified because of the low respect American culture places on math, systemic flaws in the U.S. public school education system, and a lack of role models.

The report suggests that a full 80 percent of female and 60 percent of male faculty members hired in recent years by the top research university mathematics departments in the United States were born in other countries.

To view a news release about the report, click here.

Donna Winchester, higher education reporter

Comments

Yeah, yeah, yeah.... You pay me some money, and I'll write up an "independent" report that says whatever you want... YAWN!

The US lags behind other countries in equal opportunities for women on many fronts.

According to the White House Project, US women in government leadership positions lag behind countries like Pakistan, Israel and Germany.

Corporate leadership positions for women are an oddity and the current economic downfall will put more women and children in poverty than ever before. Women will lose jobs at a much faster rate than men and take longer to find new ones.

The US still hangs on to unreasonable notions of what women can and can't do or be. We continue to see them as objects of desire. Right up until they become mothers and then we see them as free domestic labor.

After watching our President ruin our worldwide reputation and our male dominated wall street executives run our economy into the ground, I'm wondering if a woman could have done worse. I sincerely doubt it.

What we teach girls and boys is very important.

The current education trend of seperating boys and girls in grammar school just drives home the point that we just can't work together. Blaming it on adolescent hormones simply reinforces the idea that boys will be boys and shouldn't learn how to control themselves and that girls are simply a distraction; not a resource.

Before the US moves out of the dark ages, we have to let go of old myths and stories. We're not just hurting our girls, we're hurting our entire society.