6. Re: Where are all the smart girls?

Recently, Anne blogged about an article called "The Trouble with Bright Girls" by Heidi Grant Halvorson and about why girls were recently found to be so much more likely to give up on a difficult task than boys. Anne summarizes the article, which explains: "this occurs because young girls are taught through early socialization that their abilities are innate and that, should they encounter a problem they can't immediately solves, they might as well give up; boys, on the other hand, are encouraged more frequently to learn through experience and power through failure, thus making them more resilient in the face of it in later instances." I, like Anne, sometimes wonder just how much it matters that women are beginning to outnumber men in academia and other positions if they aren't speaking up, but I'd like to offer an answer--it matters. To me, at least. Regardless of how true the stats from Halvorson's article are, regardless of how many women aren't speaking up because they are judging themselves too harshly or lack the confidence to completely display their intelligence and abilities, for each woman that does speak up, there's another out there proud of her and inspired at least in some small way to do the same thing for herself. For every mother that stands strong and confident in a world that still seems too often to be run by men, there's a daughter learning that she can do the same. I'll bet that's where that adorable five-year-old learned to be so sure of herself.

Anne makes a good point. Too many women at Notre Dame and too many women everywhere are reluctant to admit to their own intelligence, and I'm guilty of being a part of that group at times. But just to cap off my soapbox speech I've started to make a little here, I'll close with this. Little by little, we're getting better at recognizing that we as women know we can make a difference and we know we're powerful. You wouldn't have seen that little girl ten years ago--and not just because there weren't as many cute kids on youtube. We're making progress. We just can't be afraid to realize that, stand up for ourselves, and not be afraid to be a little full of ourselves, if the situation warrants it.