Study: Women with straight A’s in high school and men with failing grades

[Teaching3bears]

https://news.ubc.ca/2021/02/03/good-grades-and-leadership/
 

 

[SKL]

Well first of all, who says success is defined by how many people you supervise at work?

I had 8 people answering to me at my first job, maybe up to 6 at my next, and maybe half a person now.  I am very happy being free from supervisory responsibilities!

But yeah, being a mom is gonna take away from career and other things.  There are only so many hours in the day.  You can decline a work project or promotion; you can't decline parenting responsibilities, nor would most of us want to.

I have to wonder whether people who do these studies are mothers.  When I was childless, I thought I could "do it all," if only I was smart about it.  Ha!

And I really don't care about whether it's different for fathers.  Division of labor in the home is for each couple to figure out.  I know a couple where the woman is the heavy hitter, earning millions, while the dad stays home, tutors the special needs child, and cooks the gluten-free food.  It works for them, but personally I prefer to be the one directly meeting my kids' needs more often than not.

Edited February 8, 2021 by SKL

[Guest]

Well, hmmm. Isn’t this part: 

Quote

The study focused on a group of nearly 5,000 people in the U.S. born between 1957 and 1964. The researchers had access to these people’s high school transcript data, and their responses to career-oriented surveys taken over an 11-year period from 1988 to 1998.

Making that pretty unsurprising? This is an age group nearing retirement and unlikely to move higher up the career ladder by this point. It seems to me this doesn’t necessarily speak to the reality for, say, 20-something people going forward. 

I also would like to see how that stat compares with, say, people in Denmark, who have tons of governmental support for women pursuing careers. 

[SKL]

I would also note that, while good grades do indicate some combination of intelligence and hard work, the things kids learn in school aren't necessarily what makes adults successful in the workplace.  The gift of gab, a high opinion of yourself, a thick skin, etc. are more important if "leading people at work" is the definition of success.

I also found it strange that they didn't factor in the impact of higher education.  They mentioned that it did make a difference, but didn't compare the results by gender.  Why?

[Carol in Cal.]

A lot of discrimination does exist in the professional workplace, too, though.

It’s not the whole story, but it’s part of it.

[Sneezyone]

30 minutes ago, Quill said:

Well, hmmm. Isn’t this part: 

Making that pretty unsurprising? This is an age group nearing retirement and unlikely to move higher up the career ladder by this point. It seems to me this doesn’t necessarily speak to the reality for, say, 20-something people going forward. 

I also would like to see how that stat compares with, say, people in Denmark, who have tons of governmental support for women pursuing careers. 

This. Marriage and parenthood for educated men are a plus. They’re largely a time/career suck for educated women. This pandemic has exposed that for real.

Edited February 8, 2021 by Sneezyone

[Mrs Tiggywinkle]

57 minutes ago, Sneezyone said:

This. Marriage and parenthood for educated men are a plus. They’re largely a time/career suck for educated women. This pandemic has exposed that for real.

I can only give anecdotal evidence.

DH and I started at the same company within 11 months of each other. We had roughly the same amount of paramedic experience.

The first time promotions were available, I was out on leave with a high risk pregnancy. He got the first step promotion.  The second time promotions were offered, I had just gone part time temporarily until we could better figure out life with two special needs kids.  It made sense for it to be me since I was nursing the youngest and managing the therapies. He got a second step promotion to supervisor.

At this point, he makes enough more than me that when things happen, like DD8 gets quarantined, I’m the one that takes off work.  That just adds into the mommy track, but since we are paid hourly it makes more sense for the one who makes less to be home.  Same job, start date the same, and I have more formal education, but he’s been more available to the company than I have. So he is on the promotion track, and I am not.

[Sneezyone]

21 minutes ago, Mrs Tiggywinkle said:

I can only give anecdotal evidence.

DH and I started at the same company within 11 months of each other. We had roughly the same amount of paramedic experience.

The first time promotions were available, I was out on leave with a high risk pregnancy. He got the first step promotion.  The second time promotions were offered, I had just gone part time temporarily until we could better figure out life with two special needs kids.  It made sense for it to be me since I was nursing the youngest and managing the therapies. He got a second step promotion to supervisor.

At this point, he makes enough more than me that when things happen, like DD8 gets quarantined, I’m the one that takes off work.  That just adds into the mommy track, but since we are paid hourly it makes more sense for the one who makes less to be home.  Same job, start date the same, and I have more formal education, but he’s been more available to the company than I have. So he is on the promotion track, and I am not.

Totally get it. I have been better educated than DH for our entire marriage. I also made more than he did for the first 12 years before homeschooling. It became unsustainable to maintain my full time plus hours, moving from state to state, while the military consumed all of his time. He was an unreliable backstop and local backup in rando states was both hard to come by and equally unreliable. My work wasn’t respected, considered, or valued unless it was freely offered (uncompensated) and/or benefited the service in some way. To this day, DH readily acknowledges that the most capable person in this household is me. You’d never know it from looking at our incomes tho.

Edited February 9, 2021 by Sneezyone

[regentrude]

And this is news because? To summarize: Hardworking and intelligent women born around 1960 are less likely to be found in leadership positions than even average men . Big fat Duh.

Quote

For example, research has shown that labour in the home falls disproportionately to women, which likely hinders their career prospects.
Other research has shown that post-secondary degrees are associated with greater leadership responsibilities at work. Attaining a bachelor’s degree gave a bigger boost to fathers’ career opportunities and leadership prospects than it did to mothers’.
Finally, women are more likely than men to take parental leaves or work fewer hours after their careers get under way, which leads to shorter job tenure and less cumulative work experience.

Research has shown? Bahaha. Any halfway observant person could have arrived at these "findings".

 

Edited February 9, 2021 by regentrude

[Clemsondana]

2 hours ago, Quill said:

 

I also would like to see how that stat compares with, say, people in Denmark, who have tons of governmental support for women pursuing careers. 

In the last few studies I've seen, the more support (freedom) women have, the more likely they are to choose part-time or less competitive work.  Obviously there are exceptions, but that fits with what most surveys say here, too - many women prefer part time so that they have more time with families.  And, as somebody who knows a decent number of women with STEM PhDs, I'd say probably less than 1/2 have chosen full-time work and definitely less than 1/2 sought tenure-track research professor jobs.  Many have supportive husbands and could have chosen to work more, share family responsibilities, hire a nanny, etc, but many chose more flexible/fewer hours teaching positions, research positions, or writing jobs.  I know of one family where the dad made a similar choice, and it fits their personailities.  

I was talking with a faculty member where I went to grad school - they sometimes need to track 'outcomes' to show that their PhD students go on to use theirs. I joked that, as somebody who teaches high schoolers, I was probably a disappointment.  She replied that I probably used more of what I'd learned than most researchers (who are brilliant, but research can often be deep and narrow).  And, it's true...I often pull examples from seminars that I didn't want to pay attention to at the time and end up remembering and researching all sorts of things that I realize relate to something a student was curious about.  

But, thinking about the women I know who are working full or part time in all sorts of fields, most don't aspire to management. Many teach, which involves no supervision and would have to drag averages way down.  

[Melissa Louise]

Motherhood has material consequences in a society where $ is the dominant mode of value but women undertake all tasks related to gestation, birth and (often) infant feeding, and most childcare for an extended period of time. 

Of course we see that inequity reflected in leadership....women are 51% of the population....other ppls mileage may vary but I'd like to see women proportionately represented as leaders, free to be as good (or bad!) at is as their peers. 

 

[frogger]

Quote, "If high school grade-point average is an indicator of competence and work ethic, then these steps can help keep competent, hard-working women on a path that allows society to take full advantage of their talents."

 

Although motherhood obviously impacts earnings, so that is certainly a factor, I have to add that I don't agree that high school GPA means much at all other than compliance. The work is easy and the bored have better things to do. Public Schools (at least at in my time) taught you to write down answers you'd already been given, not problem solve. And yes, I knew very well the student body government people and they were boring and not bright even if they turned in all their homework and therefore had good GPAs. 

It is possible schools have improved but since I went to school not that long after this time period, I will say, I could care less what people's GPAs from high school were. This is one of the many reasons I homeschool. I didn't want to waste the most productive years of my children's lives on busy work and fight songs. 

Edited February 9, 2021 by frogger

[gardenmom5]

5 hours ago, Clemsondana said:

In the last few studies I've seen, the more support (freedom) women have, the more likely they are to choose part-time or less competitive work.  Obviously there are exceptions, but that fits with what most surveys say here, too - many women prefer part time so that they have more time with families.  And, as somebody who knows a decent number of women with STEM PhDs, I'd say probably less than 1/2 have chosen full-time work and definitely less than 1/2 sought tenure-track research professor jobs.  M 

2dd has a STEM doc (PharmD).  Her first "real" job after graduation, she made more than her dh.  (he's very driven, and got an MBA after they married.)  She has been on the move since she was born - she hated being a baby because she had things to do and places to go and a body that couldn't.  when she had her first baby, she went to one day a week.  (her dh has the babies when she's at work. -  he's been in zoom meetings with a baby on his lap.)

She'd be happy to quit altogether, but is working a few days a month.  Being a (mostly) sahm has been an entirely new experience for her.  - though her boss has told her they'd love for her to return full time because they wanted to promote her.  (She's extremely detail oriented, could give the pied piper lessons in getting people to do things, and caught a couple very serious mistakes).  Even when she was single, not dating anyone seriously, and in school - she never wanted to run the place (and chose to not do post-doc residency because of that.), just have a job with flexibility to care for her future children.  So - she turned it down.

[SKL]

13 hours ago, Clemsondana said:

But, thinking about the women I know who are working full or part time in all sorts of fields, most don't aspire to management. Many teach, which involves no supervision and would have to drag averages way down.  

Am I the only person who thinks teaching involves a lot of supervision?  🙂

[Clemsondana]

2 hours ago, SKL said:

Am I the only person who thinks teaching involves a lot of supervision?  🙂

Hah - yes, but if students were employees that had to do what you wanted or not get paid, I think it would be a lot easier!  🙂  

[Amy in NH]

So, I haven't read the article.  But I wanted to say that the title of this thread was my ex-dh and me.  We started dating when I was 15 and he was 18.  I was a good student who graduated early and went straight to college while working a job; even though he was brilliant, the structure and authority of school did not work for him at all, and he had trouble keeping jobs.  It wasn't until a few years after he had dropped out of high school that he discovered his true passion and became passionately autodidactic.  He tried to get a job in his field-of-choice, but no-one would take him with only self-taught knowledge.  So in an I'll-show-them fit of pique, he enrolled in community technical school and aced all of his courses, transferred the associates into a bachelor into a master into a doctorate.  It was between the bachelor and master that our relationship ended.  He went on to chair a university department, but he has always maintained a bad-attitude, intellectual snobbery, and poor people-skills, so after ~10 years he was forced out.  Rumor has it he was nearly fired at the next university too, but at that point our grown-kids cut him out of their lives, so I don't know what has happened in the past few years.

DH was not a good student, either.  He knew as a teen that he wanted to go into the trades, and has become an expert in many facets of building.  He has been a good employee, and naturally moved into foreman positions starting at a young age.  He now does estimating and project management after 30 years working in the field.  He has had problems with communication, but he has worked on it over the years and improved quite a lot; he is still working on it.

Self-awareness and a desire to improve oneself make all the difference.

[Melissa Louise]

Women (not all women) get frequently derailed in the professional ambition  which their intelligence and skills may suit, by the inconvenient fact that they are the child-makers and raisers.

And that's that, really. I know that there are business-end ways of ameliorating the effects on one's work abilities. But in the end, we have the children. And that frequently interferes in our professional ambition.

[kiwik]

If the number of employees one directly controls is the definition of success a shift manager at McDonald's ismoresucessful than a high court judge.

[lewelma]

I think a surface impact on many people is valued higher than a deep impact on just a few.