Universities should accept equal numbers of male and female students in every subject. To what extent do you a

Answer 1

Well, in theory this sounds good, but while it sounds very equal, it may result in great inequality. For example, if you had a program which could accept 100 new students, and you had 300 female students who applied, and only 50 males, You would accept every male student who applied, even if they were totally unqualified, and only one-sixth of the women. The likelihood is that you would be rejecting some really good female candidates in order to accept some really lousy males. Not only would that seem unfair on its face, but once school started, you would have to "dumb down" the program because you had these unqualified people in the program, so that even the women you DID accept would be disadvantaged. The opposite could, of course be equally possible. You could have 300 male and only 50 female applicants. Either way, the group with the larger numbers would be seriously harmed by an effort at equalizing the numbers.

Answer 2

If universities decided to do this, it would provoke a crisis in primary and secondary education. There is a huge shortage of men who want to be teachers, especially at these grade levels. So if a university had to accept equal numbers of both genders, and not enough men applied, USA would soon be facing a teacher shortage of chronic proportions.

However, as devil's advocate, let's say this "law" was put in place. Probably the salary levels and the level of respect for the institution of teaching children would change--when parents couldn't get little Mike and Ashley enrolled in school because there were not enough teachers it would surely put teaching into more important context for society.

However, why would anyone insist that equal numbers must be mandated? Why not mandate equal numbers of right- and left-handed applicants? It makes as much sense. There are very few jobs where gender actually impacts performance ability. I think there are criteria that are meaningful so why not focus upon skills and preparation rather than anatomy if the end goal is an effective and well-educated population?

Answer 3

Well, if you approach this from the perspective that there is no real academic difference between the two; then making this statement is about equal to saying that "universities should accept equal numbers of blondes and brunettes in every subject"

The question then becomes, why should gender make any more difference in selection than hair color?

Answer 4

No. Equality of sexes means equality of opportunity - that both sexes get the same encouragement to do whatever their talents allow them to do, and get admitted to the same programs and hired for the same jobs with the same levels of achievement.

In a few cases, some small changes in the standards might be justifiable. If for example, women are dropping out of physics courses, or men out of nursing courses simply because they feel overwhelmed being just about the only one there, then maybe it's worth it to allow a few extra women or a few extra men into the subject, but that should not be done rashly.

Answer 5

I disagree.

Suppose in one field you have 1000 male applicants but only 100 female applicants. This might simply reflect a difference in interests; females want to pursue other fields so they don't apply for a degree in this one. It would be unfair to the 900 men who can't get in no matter how qualified they are, simply because only 100 women applied. Its unreasonable to expect that men and women will all have exactly the same interests so that every year you'll get equal numbers of equally qualified men and women in every field from Linguistics to Marine Biology.

Answer 6

yes i also think there should be no difference between male and female.