Article here. Excerpt:
'Now I have read the book, and feel everyone should read it. I don't know of a clearer or more balanced examination of this issue. Whitmire is passionate about the need to help boys, but he respectfully presents other points of view, including those of pro-girl optimists like me. In fact, one of the book's most impressive features is its exposure of the harm done by pro-girl vs. pro-boy politics. The reluctance of either side to let the other experiment with new ways of teaching has been one of the greatest obstacles to moving all students up to their potential.
Whitmire's recommendations at the end of the book are sensible, creative and overdue. He wants more and better data on boys' progress, more innovative early reading instruction for boys, more hands-on subjects in high school, better managed and studied single-sex schools and classes and some affirmative action in college admissions. I don't think he celebrates the rise of achievement among impoverished girls, a worldwide phenomenon of immense importance, as much as he should, but that's a quibble. We have to do more for boys and stop blocking promising ideas out of fear that treating the two sexes differently would be politically incorrect.'
