page_title: Issues in higher education in the United States
section_title: Gender
hierarchical_section_title: Issues in higher education in the United States / Gender
caption_attribution_description: English: Degrees conferred in United States since 1970 by year, degree type, and gender. Dashed lines are projected. First label letters F=female, M=male. Second label letters A=Associate's, B=Bachelor's, M=Master's, D=Doctorate (includes professional degrees such as M.D., D.D.S, and law). Source: https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d12/tables/dt12_310.asp
context_page_description: Higher education in the United States is an optional stage of formal learning following secondary education. Higher education, also referred to as post-secondary education, third-stage, third-level, or tertiary education occurs most commonly at one of the 4,360 Title IV degree-granting institutions, either colleges or universities in the country. These may be public universities, private universities, liberal arts colleges, community colleges, or for-profit colleges. US higher education is loosely regulated by several third-party organizations.
  Within this vast estate many issues arise for government, staff and students.
context_section_description: In discussing student's access to education in the United States, one area of research has focused on the differences that exist between students entry and completion rates based on gender. In children born after 1960, more white women were graduating from college than white men, which was a change from children born before this time.
  
  Bailey & Dynarski (2011) found that the increase in inequality in education between low and high income groups observed over the previous 30 years had been predominantly driven by rising educational attainment among women from high-income backgrounds. In 2010–11, 33 percent more bachelor's degrees were conferred to women than men, with the gender gap projected to increase to 37 percent by 2021–22. 
  Within higher-income families, women make up a greater percentage (15% compared to 7%) of this growth. While the largest gap of educational attainment between men and women is seen in the highest income group, women are attaining higher levels of education than men in every income group. This observation poses a unique and confusing problem: if educational attainment has a positive correlation to familial income, why are more women entering and completing college than men? Bailey and Dynarski proposed that the observed educational gap by gender may be due to differing incentives to accumulate human capital. Men and women may participate in what they term "segregated labor markets" and "asymmetric marriage markets," and perhaps, to make up for those perceived market differences, woman are more motivated to obtain higher levels of education.
  The gap of educational attainment between men and women is starting at a young age and affecting students access to higher education later in life. According to Bailey & Dynarski, there are two main explanations for the gender differences in educational attainment and inequality. First, men and women respond in different and gender-specific ways to family and/or school circumstances, and second, the differences in circumstances by men and women of the same family income and race have shaped inequality in educational attainment for some time. More specifically, the bulk of primary and secondary teachers are female and women run most single-parent households. The absence of a strong male role model affects males differently from females. Studies by Bailey & Dynarski have shown that teachers provide role models to demographically similar students, and their unintended biases affect their interactions and assessments of their students.
  Woman hold nearly two thirds of all student loan debt.
caption: Degrees conferred in United States since 1970 by year, degree type, and gender (2011). Dashed lines are projected. Since 1982 more bachelor's degrees have been conferred on women. First label letters: F=female, M=male. Second label letters: A=Associate's, B=Bachelor's, M=Master's, D=Doctorate and professional degree.[99]
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