GungnirSniper writes:
"Catherine Rampell at The Washington Post has 'A message to the nation's women: Stop trying to be straight-A students.'
In her analysis of others' findings, she writes of a discouragement gradient that pushes women out of harder college degrees, including economics and other STEM degrees. Men do not seem to have a similar discouragement gradient, so they stay in harder degree programs and ultimately earn more. Data suggests that women might also value high grades more than men do and sort themselves into fields where grading curves are more lenient.
'Maybe women just don't want to get things wrong,' Goldin hypothesized. 'They don't want to walk around being a B-minus student in something. They want to find something they can be an A student in. They want something where the professor will pat them on the back and say "You're doing so well!"'
'Guys,' she added, 'don't seem to give two damns.'
Why are women in college moving away from harder degrees?"
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 13 2014, @08:44AM
There are only special programs for those falling behind, not those who are bored to tears with busywork because they are ahead.
That's not true in my state. There are a multitude of courses available for free for kids who want them: take a music-intense curriculum at school, if you're gifted take a gifted curriculum, take a science-intensive curriculum, enroll in dual-language programs, there are tons and tons of options. This starts at Kindergarten and continues through high school. Maybe you should move? None of this includes charter schools, which offer even more options.