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Leaving Boys Behind: Gender Disparities in High Academic Achievement

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  • Nicole M. Fortin
  • Philip Oreopoulos
  • Shelley Phipps

Abstract

Using data from the “Monitoring the Future†surveys, this paper shows that from the 1980s to the 2000s, the mode of girls’ high school GPA distribution has shifted from “B†to “A,†essentially “leaving boys behind†as the mode of boys’ GPA distribution stayed at “B.†In a reweighted Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition of achievement at each GPA level, we find that changes to gender differences in post-secondary expectations, in particular expectations for attending graduate or professional school, are the most important factors accounting for this trend after controlling for school ability and they occur as early as the eighth grade. This open access article is distributed under the terms of the CC-BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0) and is freely available online at: http://jhr.uwpress.org

Suggested Citation

  • Nicole M. Fortin & Philip Oreopoulos & Shelley Phipps, 2015. "Leaving Boys Behind: Gender Disparities in High Academic Achievement," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 50(3), pages 549-579.
    • Handle: RePEc:uwp:jhriss:v:50:y:2015:i:3:p:549-579
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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • I20 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Education - - - General
    • J16 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Economics of Gender; Non-labor Discrimination
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity

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