Over the past decade there has been increasing community concern for boys’ education. Too many boys lose interest in school. Boys are not achieving well enough in many areas of education, from literacy through to Year 12 results. The educational gap between boys and girls is increasing.
Low achievement at schools can have long-lasting effects. It is closely linked to unemployment and low levels of income. Both boys and girls need to do well at school to move easily into the workforce.
Disengagement of boys from school has long-term personal and social consequences. Teenage boys are more likely than teenage girls to experience alcohol and substance abuse or commit suicide. Deaths from illegal drugs also overwhelmingly involve young men.
All Australian children should be educated well and have the opportunity to gain appropriate skills and education for later in their lives. The challenge is to increase the engagement of boys and improve their educational attainment, without threatening the gains made by girls in recent years.
There are many positives about boys’ education. Both boys and girls perform well by international standards. Boys are highly competitive in maths and well represented in New Apprenticeships.
However, there are areas of concern. Boys’ literacy skills have declined over time.
Between 1975 and 1995 the proportion of 14-year-old male students who demonstrated mastery on reading tests declined from 70% to 66%, while the corresponding proportion of female students changed little, from 73% to 74%. In 2001, 88% of Year 5 boys (ie 10-11 year olds) achieved the national literacy benchmark, compared with 92% of girls.
Suspensions and expulsions involve more boys. In some schools boys account for eight out of every ten suspensions and exclusions.
In light of these statistics, the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Education and Training conducted an inquiry into the education of boys in Australian schools in 2002. The resulting report, Boys Getting it Right: Report on the inquiry into the education of boys found that, in keeping with the previous findings, while many boys in Australian schools are doing well, overall boys are not achieving as well as girls across a range of educational and social measures and this pattern is reflected in almost all other OECD countries.
An overview of issues in boys’ education is provided in the 2003 Australian Government publication: Educating Boys 
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