Why Shouldn’t Girls Outdo Boys in School?
Readers respond to an argument in our October issue.
Redshirt the Boys
Boys should start school a year later than girls, Richard V. Reeves wrote in the October issue.
Speaking as a 75-year-old man, I completely agree with Richard Reeves’s “Redshirt the Boys.” To avoid one more year of child care, my parents started me in first grade at age 5. I turned 6 in late October, making me one of the youngest boys in every class through high school. I was athletically gifted, but growth-wise almost a year behind all my classmates. I was bullied regularly. Intellectually, my feelings of inferiority left me struggling to remain interested in any subject other than math.
Reeves’s article made me wonder how much smoother my life would have been if I had been “redshirted” for a year. I hope someday
