Diane Ravitch's article posits the theory that girls are being held back from achieving in schools because of a myriad of reasons, from peer pressure to pop culture. The United States scores poorly in student achievement in comparison to the rest of the world and the SAT is an unfair test assessment for state scholarship. All of these elements combine to provide an unfortunate situation in which we as a nation live today, and while the cultural references are out of date, Madonna is no longer the role model girls aspire to in today's world, the issues are still as relevant as ever. We live in a pop culture obsessed society but I feel that gender doesn't play as large a role as it once did, or at least as it did in the…show more content… Girls are empowered and encouraged to pursue degrees in science and mathematics more in today's society than they were in the 80's. The issue here is simple: when parents do their jobs in raising their children and stop relying on others instead, then boys and girls, white or blacks, peer pressure or no things will change. Until that happens, these same problems will continue. That thesis is based upon my own experiences as a child. I did well in school, I kept my grades up, and yes, there were some students who liked to make fun of me for pursuit of achievement. I received some of the same name calling and derision as Ravitch describes in her article. Words like “nerd and “ dweeb” were spoken but I wasn't the only one who heard such things. I was also interested in pop culture at the time. I had interests outside of school, like every other child my age. What I also had at the time were parents who were supportive of my interests and more importantly devotion towards education. They were present in my life, they made sure I always did my
