Richard Reeves 2-22-2026

Good morning and welcome to Town Square Sunday. I'm Jim Phillips. This program highlights non-profit agencies throughout Greater New Bedford and the work they do to improve the quality of life here on the south coast. One of those non-profits is Nativity Prep in New Bedford. That's a private non-profit school for boys of middle school age. The school is sponsoring a community presentation on March 3rd from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Whaling Museum. Noted author Richard Reeves will be the guest speaker. The talk is entitled The Silent Crisis, Addressing the Educational Struggles of Boys and Men. Reeves is a leading voice nationally about boys and men's education and he is with us today. Mr. Reeves, welcome and thank you for making some time. Thank you for having me. All right. Tell us a little bit about yourself. I know you've written some books, including a book about this subject, I believe. Tell me a little bit about you. Yeah, so I have written about this issue on boys and men. I'm actually a father as well. I'm a boy dad. I have three sons, all now in their 20s. So cost center number three, as I affectionately refer to them, has just left the nest and is off on his own. So I'm a dad too, as you can probably tell from the way I talk. I'm originally from the UK. I'm a proud US citizen now, very proud to become a citizen in 2016. And I've been really around kind of policy work, mostly on inequality issues around education, race, class. And I was at the Brookings Institution for 10 years in Washington, D.C., which is what led me to this work. And I now run a new small nonprofit think tank called the American Institute for Boys and Men, which is trying to continue to raise awareness of this issue, but also more importantly, to just in a way that's very much not near the zero sum, right? We've got it. There's still so much to do for women and girls, but also to take seriously the work we need to do for boys and men. And that's true from each individual school up to the state house and even the White House. Yeah. You have said, Richard, that boys are falling behind in school from a very early age. I think we've all kind of seen that in our own lives where we've seen boys who just can't adjust or can't adjust right away, I guess. It's a hard thing to explain. What's the biggest reason you think that young men or boys struggle right out of the gate? Well, I mean, the blunt fact is that we do just mature a little bit later. I mean, I think that's just a fact. The average five-year-old boy is not quite as grown up, if you like, as the average five-year-old girl. And that's also true for 15-year-olds, as anybody that's been around any 15-year-olds will confirm, right? There just is a difference in the pace of development. And so as you say, yeah, boys start behind, especially in reading. Actually, reading and literacy are really where you see these big gaps, and that's very, very predictive of what happens after that. And by the end of high school, there's a gap of about a year in reading schools, right? Girls finish high school about a year ahead of boys. On average, this is across the whole nation. Claire Kane Miller had a lovely piece in the New York Times about this a couple of weeks ago, showing that gap. And there isn't really a very big gap in math anymore. And to the extent there is, it sort of tends to favor boys. And there's a huge gap in grades as well. And the result of that is just a huge gap on college campuses. And so this goes all the way through, from kindergarten through high school and into college. And in fact, on college campuses now, we have a bigger gender gap than we did in the 1970s, but it's the other way around. So a different way to put that is that women are further ahead of men on college campuses today than men were ahead of women in the early 70s when we passed Title IX to help women. So that just gives you a sense of how this then plays all the way through the education development. I also think the lack of male teachers is a big issue, especially like in mainstream co-ed public schools, the share of male teachers. In the 80s, it was about 33%. It's now 23% and falling. It's a 10 percentage point drop in the share of men, share of teachers who are men. I'm very proud that my oldest son has become a fifth grade teacher in Baltimore, Baltimore City. But there's just not so many men around. And I think that sends a message to boys that maybe this whole learning thing is not something for boys, for me. And what's the old phrase from the women's movement? If you can't see it, you can't be it. And so I just think we haven't done a very good job of role modeling for boys. And then the last thing I'll say is just actually more hands-on learning styles, more applied learning seems to favor boys a little bit more than girls. And so if we're not investing in... I'm not talking about old-fashioned shop class here. I'm talking about just more applied learning seems to just work a bit better for boys. We haven't done enough of that. In your book, you talk about the idea of giving boys an extra year before starting school. Can you explain why you think the extra time could make a real difference? Yeah, it's because boys are younger than girls. It sounds odd when I say that, but they just are. They're developmentally behind. And that really is true at the beginning, as you said a minute ago. But it really shows up in adolescence by the time you get to high school. It's a big difference. And so the idea there is at least to have the option of boys having what some scholars call the gift of extra time to develop, to mature, and to have that extra year of pre-K early education. There's some evidence that that will help to level the playing field and give boys a chance. It's an odd thing to say this, but in a way, if you want a more level playing field in schools, then one way to do that is for the boys to be a little bit older in terms of their actual age, because that means that they'll be closer to the girls in their developmental age. Because right now, we've got classes where the girls are just older than the boys on average. And so that's the idea behind that, is to just give the boys a bit more time. All right. You highlight a huge reading gap between boys and girls as well. What's one simple thing that parents or teachers can do to help boys get more excited about reading? I know it's a... I mean, personally, I always enjoyed reading and enjoyed reading not everything, but things that I like. And that may not be the best educational plan, but that's really what I enjoyed. So what is there? Is there a simple thing that teachers and parents can do to get their kids, primarily boys, reading more? Yeah, well, I'll come back just briefly to this teacher point. It's really striking to me that we have very few men in schools, especially in middle schools, and the subject that men are least likely to teach is English and reading, right? Like 10% of middle school teachers. So if I could wave a magic wand, I would want that. It's partly based on my personal experience, because I didn't like reading until Mr. Wyatt, who was one of my teachers, introduced me to it. He was a military vet and actually decoded this idea for me. So I think, again, to repeat the point about just like having men around with books and helps and teaching. But I think for parents and teachers too, it's just A, first of all, recognize that this is going to be harder for boys. So we show special programs for them, like tutoring programs, early literacy programs. They seem to help boys more than girls. And I think that's because the boys are behind, right? And so finding ways to invest in resources to have those reading groups. But the last thing I'll say relates to what you said, which is you said, enjoyed reading things that I liked, that I was interested in. And so I think it's also incredibly important that the content of the books, the content of the material they're reading, et cetera, is appealing to boys. It needs to be at least as appealing to boys as it is to girls. And I think we've overcorrected on that a little bit. When I looked at this reading list that my own sons had coming home from public school, you know, I'm not sure that they were, I'm not sure they were designed with boys in mind, let's put it that way. We shouldn't be shy of that. Yeah. Are you suggesting that the movement towards getting young women involved in education and, you know, the whole women's movement is somehow worked out badly for boys? Is that what you're suggesting? No, but I can see that's the danger, of course, that people might be hearing that. I just had a long conversation with Gloria Steinem, who of course is an absolute icon of the women's movement, about this very issue. No, I think that's the challenge, is that we want women and girls to do even better on every front, educationally, economically. The rise of women is something that we should be extraordinarily proud of. I think it's the greatest economic liberation in human history across the world. So that's what's not causing it. Let's come back to this point. It's not a zero-sum game, right? We don't need girls to do worse for boys to do better. But in education, at least, it's quite clear that the bigger challenge now is with boys, right? I mentioned some of these gaps, right? And they're just very, very big. And so if you just look at the data and you're saying, okay, which sex or gender needs the most attention now in school and college? I don't know. Let's go look at the data. And you have to come to the conclusion that right now, the bigger priority is making sure that our schools are boy-friendly and that parents, to come back to your earlier point, are paying even more attention to their boys and reading to them and getting them ready for school. They will just take a bit more work. That doesn't mean we don't have to hold girls back to lift boys up. That wasn't true the other way around. We didn't need to hold men back for boys to do better, to do worse, rather, for women to do well. And that's the key message I'm going to be reiterating again this week at Nativity Prep, which is it's not a zero-sum game. And I think for too many years, people have felt that it is. And somehow to care about boys and men requires you to care less about women and girls, and nothing could be further from the truth. You're listening to Town Square Sunday. I'm Jim Phillips. My guest is Richard Reeves. Mr. Reeves is an author. He'll be talking in New Bedford March 3rd at the Whaling Museum at the invitation of Nativity Prep. The talk is entitled The Silent Crisis, Addressing the Educational Struggles of Boys and Men. Mr. Reeves, you also point out that boys from low-income families and black boys, African-American boys, face additional challenges. What's one change you think schools could make that would help these boys the most? Well, I think some of the things we've already talked about, Jim, around maybe some extra pre-K, I think there's an even bigger lack of male teachers of color in our schools, so representation I think matters too. And I would actually add also the issues around extracurricular activity. I think we tend to focus on the classroom, and that's, of course, important. And we've mentioned some of the ways we might do better there. But I also think particularly for those boys from lower-income backgrounds, it's also the after-school activities. It's the athletics, it's the clubs, it's the reading, it's the debating, whatever it is. And actually, male teachers are much more likely to be doing those extracurriculars than female teachers are, for all kinds of reasons, probably without child care. So, you know, I think for a lot of people, like that coach of the after-school soccer team, or the guy that leads the debate team, or the chess club, or, you know, the history club focusing on, I don't know, let's stereotype here and say, you know, wartime history or whatever, right? Those can actually be incredibly impactful. The problem is a lot of low-income boys can't afford it. Their families can't afford it, and or the schools don't offer it. And so I think that one of the big things we can do to close some of these class and race gaps, in addition to everything else we've said, is invest very heavily in the stuff that happens around school and after school, as well as within the classroom. All right. You've said in the past that neither political party is really addressing the struggles of boys and men. What's one policy idea you think both sides could get behind? They don't get behind much these days, but is there something in this subject matter that they could get behind, do you think? I do, and I want to update that position, actually, because that was true, I think, back in 2021, 2022, when I was writing it, that politicians weren't addressing it. But we now have, very soon, Virginia will create the first commission on boys and men. The new governor, Abigail Spanberger, is expected to sign that very soon. And we have a series of governors from Spencer Cox in Utah, Wes Moore in Maryland, and probably most strikingly, Gavin Newsom in California, Gretchen Whitmer in Michigan, really actually pushing on this issue. So I could not say that today with a straight face. I think there are serious policy makers now, especially at the state level, taking this issue seriously. And there are a couple of areas where I really think there's an opportunity for bipartisanship here is, one, we've already mentioned, male teachers. So Josh Hawley, who's the senator from Missouri, and is, I think, a pretty, I think most people would agree, is definitely to the right of the political spectrum. He said more male teachers would be a good idea, and so have Bernie Sanders, you know, on the left, the American Psychological Association. So I think that's one. And then I think there is more investment in, let's call it hands-on learning, you know, career and technical education, technical high schools, etc., which are good for some girls, too. I don't want to say that actually there aren't girls who can benefit from that as well, but boys and men particularly benefit from apprenticeships, career and technical learning, etc. And that seems to me to be an area where we could really rally behind. If the U.S. could do much better just on apprenticeships alone, where we're currently the worst in the advanced economic world in terms of our investments in apprenticeships, really, we're a world laggard when it comes to apprenticeships. And as I mentioned at the top, I'm from the U.K., where apprenticeships are much more common. I don't see any reason why that has to be a Republican issue or a Democrat issue, and I'm hoping we'll see some progress on that in the next few years. And that is a very male-friendly policy, whether it's described like that or not. More investment in apprenticeships and technical high schools would help a lot of our boys and men. And I think the last thing I'd just talk about is regulation of things like sports betting. We are doing a lot of work on that issue at our institute now. We have a sports betting hub that is hitting young men especially hard. And so, again, I don't think that sensible regulation of online sports betting should be a Republican or a Democrat issue. That should just be an issue for all of us. Fathers. We all have an idea about how important fathers are and the role they can play in their sons' lives. But there are many homes, and I'll say sadly here in New Bedford, there are many homes with single parents. Usually it's the mother, and the fathers have walked away. How can we help those situations? Yeah, well, I mean, unfortunately, marriage promotion policies have been proven to be completely unsuccessful. There's really nothing that the government can do or policymakers can do to promote marriage. I mean, marriage rates have stabilized in recent years. But I think we just have to accept the reality that one of the points of the women's movement was to make women more economically independent. And they have become much more economically independent. And that's a good thing. But it does then raise this question about what does that mean for families? What does it mean for fathers? You know, like, my dad knew that his main role was to be the breadwinner. He's in his 80s now, right? That was his main role. And they had a very equal marriage, but it was very lopsided in many ways because he had to be the breadwinner. That's much less true of me, and it's definitely not true for my sons. And so what we have to do is find a way to keep dads in their kids' lives, even if they're not in a relationship with the mom. That's the key. And we're doing a pretty bad job of that. The child support system is not very family friendly. We don't have paid paternity leave that really kind of helps dads connect. We miss our chances in the health care system. And come back to the education system. Schools need to be really reaching out to dads to make sure that they should be in the school. There's a Dads at the Doors program in, I think it's North Carolina, which is a really nice program. It just says to dads, have some dads around the school welcoming the kids in the morning before they go off to work. We call it Dads at the Doors. And I love that because it's just saying to dads, look, we need you. Welcome the kids. Make the place feel more safe. You know, create a nice environment. But it's also the kids who are experiencing, like, their dad being the kind of greeter at their school. And so simple things like that, I think, can go a long way so that dads know that we still need them. Last question. You encourage getting more men into health jobs, health education, administration, literacy. How do we get young boys early on to see those careers as options? Well, one way to do it is by doing it through things like early apprenticeships and internships, right? So that overlaps what we're talking about a minute ago, right? And there's some states are really developing that, which is how to start doing these apprenticeships and these earning and learning programs in high school. But the other thing is, like, we need men who are nurses, who are teachers, who are working health care, who are maybe working areas like mental health to be going into schools and talking to boys. And because it doesn't occur to the boys. We've done work showing that, like, it just literally doesn't occur to boys that those are for them in ninth or tenth grade. And we've made a huge difference in the way girls think about STEM subjects or law or medicine or science, right? Just think about the transformation and you can see it. Actually, women that now account for most people doing STEM degrees, right? That didn't happen just by itself. It happened as a result of intentional policy and investment. And so I would love us to be investing philanthropy policy into breaking down the gender stereotypes around those roles. You saw recently a lovely story about a former NFL player becoming a nurse. And as a result, a bunch of we're seeing now some high school football men saying, oh, interesting, maybe I should do that. Right. And so you can break these gender stereotypes, but it doesn't happen by itself. My guest has been Richard Reeves, noted author and speaker on the educational struggles of boys and men. He'll be in New Bedford on March 3rd as a guest of Nativity Prep, speaking at the Whaling Museum from 6 to 9 p.m. Is this a free event, Richard? Yes. It is a free event. Walk in, there's a large auditorium there and you'll get, you'll have a Q&A session. Is that, is that correct? Yes. Yes. I should say, I think it's free if you'd have to check with them, but it's a community event, so I'd be surprised if it wasn't. And yeah, there's nothing. And I would just say, please come along. And I will say this, especially if you're skeptical, if you're not convinced, if you're worried about this, if you're listening to this and going, hmm, if you're starting to squint your eyes a little bit and you're like, please come along. I think this is a, it's a, it's a important conversation, but it's not an easy one. And I want as many people in it as possible, including those who come to it with a degree of skepticism. Richard Reeves, my guest. Thank you very much, sir, for your time. We appreciate it. Thank you. Still to come on Town Square Sunday, Jack Spillane from the New Bedford Light online newspaper joins us with a look at some talk, but local stories stay with us.