Of girls, boys, schools and schooling

Gender stereotyping and sexism sets in early, particularly in the absence of co-ed schooling. It disrupts lives and careers

By Chandan K Jha & Sudipta Sarangi

It is well known that behind every successful man there is a woman. Sometimes one also hears that behind every failed man there are many women. Our goal today then is to take these pearls of wisdom to a preceding stage — the age of boys and girls and see what we know about performance in schools vis-à-vis these statements.

Although it has been a while now, we still recall those days when we were both leaving home for the first time to pursue higher education. Among the many tearful farewells, one constant refrain was stay away from alcohol, drugs and girls — as if they were all (equally) bad for you!

We are sure girls leaving home for the hostel were given a similar sort of advice — at least that is what the girls we did not stay away from told us.