I. Starting up

How do you understand the following statement: Whatever the truth of the aphorism that a mother's place is in the wrong, it seems that working mothers, at least, are in the wrong place? Look at the graph and using the statistics in the text explain the state of affairs in the sphere of university entrance by male and female in UK:

Almost all the extra university places created since the mid-1990s have been taken by women.

University entry figures reveal that the overall rise in student numbers conceals an increasingly sharp gender divide - with the number of male students slipping further behind. Figures from the Higher Education Statistics Agency show that since 1994 the number of male students has risen on average by less than 1% per year.

In the same period, women student numbers have risen by 42%. The Hesa statistics, based on UK residents starting university courses, show a clear picture of university expansion being driven almost entirely by women. And it shows that despite prolonged drives to widen participation, the number of males entering university has failed to break out substantially above the levels already reached in the middle of the last decade.

Males falling behind

The number of women entering university has risen from around 299,000 in 1994 to 427,000 in 2001 - an increase of 128,000 in the annual intake. But the figures for male students in the same period show only slight increases and some dips in numbers - with the total having risen by 16,000 to around 305,000. As a proportion of the total student intake, it means that male students have fallen in seven years from around 49% to 41% of those entering university. The government has a target that at least 50% of young people should enter university by the end of the decade.

But these statistics suggest that if this is to be achieved, universities will either have to find a way to attract more male students - or else they will have an intake which will have an even higher proportion of women.

(the source: adapted from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/education/3261221.stm )

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Lesson 3. Modern Families.	\|	II. Reading

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