High-school girls outperform boys in school and expect to earn just as much in careers in the millennium, according to a report out Tuesday.
Girls spend more time on homework than boys (6.8 hours per week vs. 5.4) and are far more likely to expect to attend a four-year college after finishing high school, said the report sponsored by the Horatio Alger Association, a group that helps young people.
Forty-three percent of boys expect to earn $35,000 or more at the start of their careers, compared with 39% of the girls, the study said.
"Consistent with their hard work and better grades, female teens now have income expectations no different from those of males," the report said.
The report was based on a survey of 1,195 randomly chosen students ages 14-18 who will spend most of their lives in the 21st century.
Among the findings:
- Sixty percent of girls said they "try to take the most difficult and challenging courses they can," compared with 44% of boys.
- One-third of girls said they "received mostly A's on their last report card." Fewer than one-fifth of boys said the same.
- Three-fourths of girls "believe they will have many opportunities available to them after they graduate." Two-thirds of the boys agreed.
- Eighty percent of girls said it is "personally important to them that they do their best in all of their classes," compared with 65% of boys.
The report also found that minority students, on average, study more than whites. And white girls study more than white boys.
Yet only 63% of minority teen-agers, compared with 72% of white kids, believe they will find many available opportunities after they graduate.
The report's authors don't know why white boys are such lackadaisical students.
"This may be because Caucasian males feel a sense of entitlement," said Jennifer Park, the group's educational analyst. Or it may be because white boys participate in more extracurricular activities than other students.
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