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The Truth About Boys and Girls

Tune into NBC Nightly News' special series, The Truth About Boys and Girls, which looks at the differences between the sexes — and some surprising similarities, too.
/ Source: NBC News and msnbc.com

On Monday, Jan. 14, NBC Nightly News began a special weeklong series on gender, "The Truth about Boys and Girls." The first part of the series focused on the science of gender, a report by Robert Bazell that investigated how memory functions differently for males and females. Later this week, we'll also take a look at the role gender plays in education and in the workplace, with reports on the following:

It's long since been established that boys are falling behind girls in elementary school, but some researchers say it's not that girls are smarter, it's that schools are failing boys. They argue that because boys and girls develop at different rates and have different learning styles and interests, they have different needs in the classroom that aren't being met. Proponents for single-sex schools say that boys do better when they are more active in class.

Because girls graduate from high school at higher rates, there are far more female college applicants. A growing number of colleges and universities admit less qualified male applicants in order to achieve gender balance, causing an uproar on campuses. While there is now some legal precedent when it comes to affirmative action, there's confusion about the role gender should play in college admissions.


According to recent research, a dramatic pay gap between American women and men starts the year they graduate from college and continues to increase over the next decade.
One year out of college, women working full-time earn 80 percent of what men earn, and a decade later, that pay scale drops to 69 percent according to a . "If a woman and a man make the same choices, will they receive the same pay? The answer is no," the report states. "Specifically, about one-quarter of the pay gap is attributable to gender."

Tune in to NBC Nightly News at 6:30 p.m. or go to for more.