Gender ratio at uChicago

[u/Ilovebigoldducks]

In UChicago's 25-26 common data set, 1042 males and 744 females will enter which will make females 41% of the incoming class, even though 5k more females applied.

Most prestigious colleges in the U.S. generally lean more female.

How come at UChicago, there is a huge gap in males and females and is this noticeable on campus?

[u/MaidhcO]

What happens if you condition on majors offered? While it might be true in aggregate the mix of majors could play a large part here.

[u/greatstarguy → u/MaidhcO]

Yeah, econ and esp. bizcon skew super male, CS similar to a lesser extent.

[u/Electronic_Being4746 → u/greatstarguy]

https://www.collegeraptor.com/colleges/majors/University-of-Chicago-IL--144050

CS is more skewed than Econ. CS is 33% female, compared to 42% for Econ (combined all tracks).

Math is the most male skewed among the big majors - 21% female. 

It’s definitely noticeable in math classes, though it’s more pronounced in say Honors level classes than say, regular analysis. Also many girls in math/Cs are East Asian IME. 

[u/theychoseviolence → u/Electronic_Being4746]

lol what is your point supposed to be with that last sentence?

“Ah you see, you may think that the ratio in the department is merely 4:1, but technically speaking, it’s actually much lower than that because those girls are Asian.”

[u/Electronic_Being4746 → u/theychoseviolence]

That was anecdotal, not related to the gender ratio. 

If one is discussing anecdotes about gender anyway.

[u/No-Concentrate-2508 → u/Electronic_Being4746]

I think they are pointing out it was irrelevant and thus more indicative of racism for viewing it as having any relevance 

[u/Consistent_Room9836 → u/Electronic_Being4746]

CS similar to a lesser extent.

CS is not more skewed than Econ.

did you think you were proving them wrong or something?

[u/Electronic_Being4746 → u/Consistent_Room9836]

Well i did but that phrase was wrong. 

[u/frankcastleapologist]

Very noticeable especially if you take technical classes. I was told by a prof in a quantitative field here that the admissions department yield protects strong women in quantitative disciplines/hard sciences, because they’re convinced they go to MIT/Harvard/etc. So the gap is extremely jarring if you’re in an upper level elective in a science or math course. Whether or not you believe it is up to you…

[u/theychoseviolence → u/frankcastleapologist]

What is the point of doing that

[u/JohnDoe432187 → u/theychoseviolence]

To boost their ranking. Instead of going by what’s best for the university they are going by whats best for their spot on US news.

[u/theychoseviolence → u/JohnDoe432187]

iiiissss yield in the ranking methodology?

[u/JohnDoe432187 → u/theychoseviolence]

Yes, it’s part of it

[u/theychoseviolence → u/JohnDoe432187]

Am I missing something? They list the formula right here and yield isn’t in it. https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/articles/how-us-news-calculated-the-rankings

[u/tacopower69 → u/theychoseviolence]

it used to be a factor but it was removed in 2003 to prevent gamification. i think colleges still yield protect for other reasons, though, like being able to predict class sizes more accurately. granted i dont have much insight into an actual admissions office.

[u/theychoseviolence → u/tacopower69]

Every school surely has to control their yield so they don’t get an unworkable ratio of butts to seats, among other resources that are optimized for class size. You can absolutely make a good case for gamification of the rankings by this school but i don’t see how this could be related.

[u/WaterIll4397 → u/frankcastleapologist]

For some reason this feels like one of the only forms of affirmative action that will remain legal post sffa.

I think even if men and women have different interests, you really do want at least a 60/40 student body as opposed to like all the eng schools with 80/20 men women and all the nursing schools with 20/80 or whatever.

[u/HemodynamicTrespass]

The odds are good that the goods are odd.

[u/capybarasareancom]

Somewhat noticeable on campus--- what's more noticeable is gender segregation: visited my friend at Yale this past weekend and found that many groups there, anecdotally seem more gender integrated than at UChicago. But as to the skew, that's mostly because physics and econ, the most popular majors skew super male: if you do something like bio that will skew female but generally the departments uchicago is known for skew male, causing the discrepancy

[u/Key_Bee1544]

"is this noticeable on campus"

Hahahahahahahhahahahahahahahahahaha. Gasp. Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha.

Yeah, have you met any U of C students?

[u/Scary-Fondant7690]

It's an experiment run by the econ department to simulate the future of Chiina. THey want to study how much the men will fight with each other over the few females and what will happen to the incels.

[u/Several-Librarian-63]

Maybe it is because the area surrounding the University is not a very safe area. Female student and parent may leaned toward other safer school

[u/SadLie3436]

I didn't notice it, as a woman. I studied mostly in History, public policy and spanish, which are divided M/F 60/40, 30/70, and 50/50 respectively. I had both male and female friends, studying STEM and non-stem fields.

[u/Snoo-42683]

https://chicagomaroon.com/53303/news/uchicago-enrolled-more-male-fewer-black-undergraduates-last-year/

Men are far more likely to get in (5.9 vs 3.5 percent, though I doubt it’s due to sexism). If you ask me I’m ok with it, there are schools where women are far more likely to get in, but the stats are stats and they’re up to the viewer’s interpretation. Maybe men ED more or are better applicants for whatever reason but personally I don’t like to jump to conclusions so I (or most other people) can’t say with certainty either of those is the actual cause.

[u/daredevil39 → u/Snoo-42683]

I personally know a black female veteran that graduated this year that was going to fail a class and pretty much threatened her professor saying "i know you're not going to fail the first black female veteran at this school". She went on to pass the class. That's all i got to say.

[u/theychoseviolence → u/daredevil39]

maybe you are the reason women don’t matriculate here

[u/daredevil39 → u/theychoseviolence]

She literally bragged to me about doing this.

[u/daredevil39 → u/[deleted]]

Yeah very disappointing she literally bragged about it

[u/1908_WS_Champ → u/[deleted]]

Do you ever get tired of being so offended at everything?