I know what he's referring to, it just doesn't matter. It's a red herring.

How one does in school is not solely dependent upon their mental acuity. It never has been.

There's whether or not education is valued in the home, poverty factors, whether or not you have older siblings, quality of educational materials, quality of instruction, affect of interuptuons and disruptions to learning, whether or not help is available if you need it, availability of additional resources, etc.

All of these things affect student performance.

If you want to find out why boys are lagging behind, you start looking at how each of these might impact boys more than girls and I'd start with that first one.

But first, I'd confirm whether or not fewer boys are qualifying for college in the first place.

In other words, if they qualify to go but are choosing not to, then the enrollment drop is not a result of boys being oppressed by education favoring girls.

If you listen to boys (remember, Urchling is 19 so I've had some recent opportunity here), they're giving a lot of rwasons for not going to college. I have not yet heard, "because I don't qualify; I can't pass the entrance exam".