CNN Study: Girls equal to boys in math skills

Study: Girls equal to boys in math skills

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sixteen years after Barbie dolls declared, "Math class is tough!" girls are proving that, at math, they are just as tough as boys.
Girls have caught up on test scores, which researchers attribute to more taking higher math classes like calculus.

Girls have caught up on test scores, which researchers attribute to more taking higher math classes like calculus.

In the largest study of its kind, girls measured up to boys in math in every grade, from second through 11th. The research was released Thursday in the journal Science.

Parents and teachers persist in thinking boys are simply better at math, said Janet Hyde, the University of Wisconsin-Madison researcher who led the study. And girls, who grew up believing it, wound up avoiding harder math classes.

"It keeps girls and women out of a lot of careers, particularly high-prestige, lucrative careers in science and technology," Hyde said.

That's changing, albeit slowly. Women are now earning 48 percent of undergraduate college degrees in math; they still lag far behind in physics and engineering.