Male Applicants

[Rmed14]

Does anybody truly know or have proof wether or not male applicants have an easier time getting admitted. Like for example a male with a lower GPA and sub par GRE scores with good LOR's and such may have an easier time getting into some schools because they are seeking more diversity? Anybody have any stories or proof of this?

[OverCaffeinated]

youre talking about positive discrimination haha? 

i know the program at the toronto schol has 1 male student a year. whether or not it was easier for him to get in im not sure. but theres always one according to my prof

[IAmOneJame]

It certainly does not say anywhere that we will have an easier time, and I really would not want that either. I have heard from many students and even some faculty that it adds diversity in a field starved of males, but I pretend like it has no bearing on getting accepted. If I earn it, great. The girls in my program joke that I am a shoo-in, but I have known quality male candidates that did not get in. Basically, do not bank on your gender getting you in. However, in reality it may give us a slight advantage if we were comparable to another candidate in every other way, aside from gender, to get in.

[Jolie717]

This is completely hearsay, but I remember reading once that ASHA does check to see if the admitted students in a program are an accurate reflection of the applicant pool.  It sort of makes sense, but sounds a bit complicated to me.  If true it would mean that certain groups would have no advantage over other groups.

[jmk]

Besides personal opinion, I haven't found an article or statement voicing one way or the other. 

My thoughts: For the initial cut of applicants, what about potential legal ramifications giving an applicant an edge up due to gender, race, or religion? (all which can sometimes be assumed from just one's name). What about personal bias/discrimination? Thus: I would not think that gender would be a complete pull factor to make up for mediocre GPA or GRE.

The final cut? I could imagine, comparing two applicants with near equal statistics, that perhaps a program would choose a minority (for CSD): whether it be race or gender. 

Those are my personal speculations, haha. 

[mr479]

There is a older article that suggests that male acceptances run the gamut from high to low GPAs, as low as 2.7, whereas female acceptances run a much tighter range. So, the statistics suggest that yes, men do have a slight advantage expectation wise over a comparable female applicant. I will try and locate this for you. I know the study is out there, but it's not the most recent. 

Edited November 19, 2015 by Pennsatucky

[mr479]

Here you go: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.asha.org/uploadedFiles/asha/publications/cicsd/1999FAComparisonofCharacteristics.pdf&ved=0CB4QFjABahUKEwiBlaCY9pvJAhUIm4gKHc-hDmY&usg=AFQjCNFvznhNbyHvESNoeTPnzgbKcYM34g

 

[jmk]

34 minutes ago, Pennsatucky said:

Here you go: https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=http://www.asha.org/uploadedFiles/asha/publications/cicsd/1999FAComparisonofCharacteristics.pdf&ved=0CB4QFjABahUKEwiBlaCY9pvJAhUIm4gKHc-hDmY&usg=AFQjCNFvznhNbyHvESNoeTPnzgbKcYM34g

 

Very interesting read! Thanks for digging that up. 

[CBG321]

Without concrete evidence I would say no, gender alone will not get you any preference in entering graduate school.  Like an earlier poster said the only time I would say you MIGHT have an advantage is if you have top of the line stats and your application is nearly identical to a female applicants (also with desirable stats) at that point I believe they may say hey let's take the guy because he has something different to offer.  Which is great because it would be nice to see a little more gender diversity in our field :).

Before that point I doubt they care about your gender, while sifting through 500+ applications.  They probably won't be separating their files based on gender and saying oh if this was a girl she would not meet our gpa cutoff but it's a guy so we will keep him.  If you don't meet their cutoffs for GRE and GPA the fact that you are male won't even be noticed.

Plus on the other hand say they keep a slot for one+ male student, there are plenty of male applicants with high stats so they would get priority over lower stats.  I would hope that someone doesn't get into a program solely based on their gender since it would be a shame for other students working their bums off to be left in the cold.   

Just my opinion though I have no real insider knowledge to support this.  

[Rusty Shackelford]

I'm a male and I'm applying to two competitive programs with a low gpa (3.11).  Similar to some other posters, I had a lot of female classmates make comments about how I'd get in easily just being male.  I hope there's at least some truth to it.

[mr479]

8 hours ago, CBG321 said:

Without concrete evidence I would say no, gender alone will not get you any preference in entering graduate school.  Like an earlier poster said the only time I would say you MIGHT have an advantage is if you have top of the line stats and your application is nearly identical to a female applicants (also with desirable stats) at that point I believe they may say hey let's take the guy because he has something different to offer.  Which is great because it would be nice to see a little more gender diversity in our field :).

Before that point I doubt they care about your gender, while sifting through 500+ applications.  They probably won't be separating their files based on gender and saying oh if this was a girl she would not meet our gpa cutoff but it's a guy so we will keep him.  If you don't meet their cutoffs for GRE and GPA the fact that you are male won't even be noticed.

Plus on the other hand say they keep a slot for one+ male student, there are plenty of male applicants with high stats so they would get priority over lower stats.  I would hope that someone doesn't get into a program solely based on their gender since it would be a shame for other students working their bums off to be left in the cold.   

Just my opinion though I have no real insider knowledge to support this.  

Research shows otherwise. I think people on this forum are looking for real answers. 

[mr479]

5 hours ago, Rusty Shackelford said:

I'm a male and I'm applying to two competitive programs with a low gpa (3.11).  Similar to some other posters, I had a lot of female classmates make comments about how I'd get in easily just being male.  I hope there's at least some truth to it.

Hopefully, you're applying to more than two, competitive schools.  

[Jolie717]

8 minutes ago, Pennsatucky said:

Research shows otherwise. I think people on this forum are looking for real answers. 

That being said - you yourself mentioned how old the study was - 16 years old right?  Some of you (young ones lol) may not truly realize how much things may have changed in 16 years.  At my school they remove the personal info (ethnicity, gender, age etc) and have three members of the admissions committee evaluate specific parts of each application with a rating scale.  Of course there are probably elements of the SOP in particular and maybe letters of rec that can't be edited to eliminate these identifiers, so I'm not entirely sure how that works.  It might be purely the academic (GPA) and test score portion of the app that is completely "blind" so to speak.  Just my two cents!

[ImHis]

I don't think being a male will increase your chances of admission. I had a low GPA (3.0), GRE scores in the 50%, great references and it took me 2 application cycles until I was accepted. The only difference I made was I obtained a higher ranked reference, overhauled my horrible SOP, and got a 4.0 in my prerequisites. I experimented with 1 application and promoted how I can add diversity, but it may not have been deemed appropriate by 1 school and I was rejected.

I consider myself a quadruple minority in SLP:  Male, gay, person of color with an invisible disability. For one school that embraces cultural diversity, I talked about my cultural values and beliefs and how I can apply it in the field. I think that helped to reveal my personality. That school also accepted me. Personally, admissions in our field are interested in learning about your purpose and academic and clinical contributions, not in-born genetic traits.

Edited November 20, 2015 by ImHis
typo

[CBG321]

8 hours ago, Jolie717 said:

That being said - you yourself mentioned how old the study was - 16 years old right?  Some of you (young ones lol) may not truly realize how much things may have changed in 16 years.  At my school they remove the personal info (ethnicity, gender, age etc) and have three members of the admissions committee evaluate specific parts of each application with a rating scale.  Of course there are probably elements of the SOP in particular and maybe letters of rec that can't be edited to eliminate these identifiers, so I'm not entirely sure how that works.  It might be purely the academic (GPA) and test score portion of the app that is completely "blind" so to speak.  Just my two cents!

Thank you that's exactly what I was basing my comment on!  A 16 year old study is not suggestive of the current grad school climate and programs in my state also remove identifying information.  So yes mine is anecdotal but I feel that it's probably on par with the times since I know in my program at least they would not accept anyone with a low gpa male or female so there would not be a chance to make it to the nitty gritty stage of letters and rec forms.  In fact to take it a step further (some of the committees, they swap who is on it each year) put their top 50 or whatever in a pile and literally just pick from the pile.  So no being male will not give you an advantage at very competitive programs.    

[skeener687]

Based on my observations (which, admittedly, are very subjective), I would argue that competitive male applicants do have an advantage over similarly ranked females. For instance, at my school, each cohort of 20 tends to have anywhere from one to three males (seems like usually two, but it varies). So for a cohort of 20, two males would be 10% of the cohort. From what statistics I could gather, males make up around 5% of the SLP population. IF the percentage of males applying to SLP Master's programs is similar to the percentage of male SLPs out there, it seems unlikely that so many males could be accepted in a given cohort fairly consistently year after year. I've seen cohorts at other schools with even more males relative to overall cohort size. I'm not saying none of these men deserved to get in; in fact, I think they're all great students/SLPs. However, I do think they get in over equally qualified females.

It's completely possible that many more males are applying to SLP grad programs in recent years, or that they tend to be concentrated in certain areas, etc., which would mean that what I see is not based on any type of gender advantage. I'm just not sure I believe that though. I don't think it's about preference for inborn traits, per se, but cultural perspectives or beliefs about men versus women and what different ideas or approaches males can contribute to a female-dominated field. I personally believe there's some level of bias, whether admissions committees are conscious of it or not.

[slpdee]

This data is a lot more recent. It observed the school years 2012-2013. The data research covers beyond just gender, but according to the information provided by the schools males seem to make up close to 6% of the undergraduate students and also make up 4.75% of master's students. 

http://www.asha.org/uploadedFiles/2012-2013-CSD-Education-Survey-National-Aggregate-Data-Report.pdf 

This was shown on the second to last bullet on page 15 and the chart on page 29. It doesn't take into account how many males applied compared to women , but I thought that this at least showed the stats are similar between undergrad and grad students for SLP. 

[Crimson Wife]

Audiology and PhD. programs in CSD/Hearing & Speech Science both skew a bit less heavily female than SLP so it makes sense that there are more male CSD undergrads than SLP students. It would be interesting to see stats on career aspirations for male vs. female CSD undergrads.

[slpdee]

That's actually included in the document! I know it's really long. It's on page 32. I decided to add up all of the masters/doctorate information for both male and female to find this ratio. I still don't know the percentage of which gender applies for higher education, but it looks like out of 14,710 people in either a master's or doctorate program for SLP, speech and hearing, and audiology males make up 7%. 

[mr479]

I know a few guys with <3.0 GPAs on this forum who've gained admission, but not any women. Despite the profession's efforts to attract more males to the field for the last 15 years, the number of male SLPs still hovers around 5%. With that in mind, I don't think a 16 year old study is out of date at all and is just as true now as it was then. Even with grade inflation, I think faculty are more willing to take a chance on a male applicant than on a female one with similar stats. The trend indicates as much. 

[slporbust2016]

On 11/19/2015, 7:25:39, Rusty Shackelford said:

I'm a male and I'm applying to two competitive programs with a low gpa (3.11).  Similar to some other posters, I had a lot of female classmates make comments about how I'd get in easily just being male.  I hope there's at least some truth to it.

Wow. You're really hoping that you beat out someone more qualified based on your gender?

I know one male SLP. He was a stellar student all around, and he's a medical SLP now. He said he might have had a slight edge getting started in medicine, but he's not even sure about that. 

[esopha]

3 hours ago, slporbust2016 said:

Wow. You're really hoping that you beat out someone more qualified based on your gender?

I know one male SLP. He was a stellar student all around, and he's a medical SLP now. He said he might have had a slight edge getting started in medicine, but he's not even sure about that. 

If he gets into a program, he's just as qualified as anyone else in that program.

Not speaking directly to you, but I generally really dislike discussions of whether being of a certain background makes you more likely to get into any competitive program. The thought that there are going to be two identical candidates, both with the exact same types of experience, but different demographics is just a strawman. This is very, very unlikely to ever happen. There are oodles of qualified candidates for a very small number of positions, and the fact is that admission isn't guaranteed for anyone. Also, we have no idea what ad comms are looking for in terms of their class compositions. They probably are looking for diversity. They're also definitely looking for academic ability. The spots in a program don't "belong" to anyone - no one "beats" anyone else out of a spot because it's not like they're competing one-on-one for spots, you know?

I mean, I'm a minority in SLP, but not a minority in higher ed by any means (queer Asian woman). Do I think I have an edge? I don't know. It's impossible to know. But it also doesn't matter, because the upshot of all of these conversations is trying to stare into a crystal ball to see the future, when all you can do is do your best and apply. (That said, if someone rejects me because of my demographics, I'll gladly do a happy dance, because I don't want to go to that program. Hear me, universe? I'd rather have the rejection! Don't listen to my begging in two months when the anxiety catches up to me, lol.)

A problem that does exist is worrying so much about being a competitive candidate that you narrow your interests and application into being some kind of application-robot that indicates no personality whatsoever. Ad comms can certainly tell when you're parroting exactly what you think they want you to hear.

[slporbust2016]

Listen, I get that everyone wants to get into a program, but this poster actually said that he hopes it's true that he'll have an easier time getting into a program because of his gender. 

As someone older than most applicants, I guess I see that as an affront to all of the women that I know in other fields who've had bad situations from males in their field assuming that they got preferential treatment for being females in a male-dominated field. 

I also dislike the constant posts about who will get into school. The answer is whoever the Ad Comm picks. I just find it in really poor taste to actually voice the opinion that you hope you get in based on your gender. 

[esopha]

I don't think that point of view has anything to do with your age. (It's also kind of patronizing to suggest that you have a better grasp on issues of gender disparity because of your age. I come from a highly competitive industry background and have had plenty of need to smack down misogyny even though I'm probably younger than you are.) I agree that it's counterproductive and, frankly, mildly offensive that a man can make a statement about entry into a female-dominated field that ignores the preferential treatment that men get just about everywhere else. It's just tone-deaf.

I guess I just bristle at the statement "getting in over someone more qualified because of X" because that's the exact argument that people against affirmative action use, all the time, and I kind of jumped the gun on what you were saying. The fact of the matter is that it's completely bonkers to try and game admissions like this - to say that X person will get in only because of their demographics, or that Y group of people need to have better stats. While the trends are out there and true, at the end of the day, that has no bearing whatsoever on whether you, an individual, will make it into a school. There are too many soft, qualitative aspects to admissions.

The overall point I was trying to make was that these types of calculations are useless. As long as you're inside the wondrous bell curve of admitted students' statistics, you have a shot at getting in. Everything else is just a crap shoot.

Down with the patriarchy. *fistbump*

[mr479]

19 hours ago, slporbust2016 said:

 Listen, I get that everyone wants to get into a program, but this poster actually said that he hopes it's true that he'll have an easier time getting into a program because of his gender. 

As someone older than most applicants, I guess I see that as an affront to all of the women that I know in other fields who've had bad situations from males in their field assuming that they got preferential treatment for being females in a male-dominated field. 

I also dislike the constant posts about who will get into school. The answer is whoever the Ad Comm picks. I just find it in really poor taste to actually voice the opinion that you hope you get in based on your gender. 

I know a few terrible male students that definitely don't deserve to be in grad school. I've done most of their work for them (group projects). I can't imagine how they got into grad school other than the fact that they're male.