"Why do boys lag behind girls in academic achievement?" In the third paragraph I basically just say "it's complicated". I actually try not to address that, since a bunch of the reason boys lag behind girls has nothing to do with the school system. For instance, boys are more affected by poverty and fatherlessness than girls, boys have a harder time sitting still and with auditory learning. Boys are less motivated by the classroom environment as it is now than girls (but not necessarily by all classroom environments) partially because it just doesn't cater to boys and we're still figuring out the pedagogy thing. This affect seems to be larger in topics other than math and science. Boys are also apparently discriminated against.

In many cases we can't just "do this" and deal with the issues, which should be obvious from the issues mentioned in the 2nd paragraph

Perhaps I can incorporate some of what I just said into the introduction

but most of that is going to feel rather handwavey

and perhaps a little hard to cite

I could probably find a citation for boys being less suited to auditory learning

..

Secondly, the advantage, while substantial in impact on boys, is relatively slight. Relatively

It's a headline, it needs to get attention

Otherwise people won't click

it works out to boys being somewhere between 0.22 of a standard deviation behind, but that's over a large period of time, it might be smaller or larger if I were to try to find results for just the last decade

"what can we do about it" is a call to action and it works psychologicallly

I like that, and I also don't have a problem with answering "well, its complicated"

and then going into the details

thanks, I'll do that

That's a question I can ask. I'll use it to fix the double-question.

..

As for the title, that is harder

Right now my heading is simply "An Issue of Education", which on a site called menarehuman should be descriptive enough

But it might not be the best

In general practice, it's better to be more descriptive

Yeah, but how does one be more descriptive on what is effectively a rather broad research paper?

..

For the two of you, do you have any comments for the end of the article?

I could use a second opinion on that even before the middle stuff is dealt with.

I mean, anyway our sons being at disadvantage is the gist of the paper, right

I suppose I don't think so

The point, I think, is that they aren't fully supported (and are suffering as a result).

Although relative disadvantage is pretty useful when demonstrating that there is a problem, it is difficult when it comes to making the issue matter. Because relative disadvantage doesn't really matter by itself

But at the same time

I don't really have numbers, data on the real impact on boys for any of this.

So perhaps simply being at a disadvantage is all I can make a direct point

Relative disadvantage would had mattered a lot if it was girls that were disadvantaged

Yes, yes it would

We can call it a disadvantage then

Sure

Sorry, I was thinking aloud, the gist of the paper probably ultimately is boys being at a disadvantage

I'm just slightly dissatisfied with stopping there

but also want to keep very grounded in evidence

@asparkofpyrokravte I bet it seems like it's getting ridiculously long to 'get it right'... But it's worth it mate

I'm sorry to have told you that it seems wrong. But you need to know