Six years ago while teaching at a public school in the San Francisco Bay area with a predominantly Asian population, I served on the school’s Site Council, which was responsible for overall school issues. Asked to identify students who needed the most help and guidance, we were given four sets of data on negative student outcomes – (1) disciplinary actions, (2) graduation rates, (3) standardized test scores, and (4) grade results. The goal was to find a pattern among the results that would let us identify groups of students. For a high school with an ideologically Left faculty, finding any at-risk group had rarely meant including males, especially white males. But as we combed through the results, a surprising pattern emerged for the teachers, administrators, and parents: Males outnumbered all other groups in each of the four categories. Not only that, the majority of the males were white. The data sets showed males receiving twice as many disciplinary actions than other groups, having lower graduation rates, scoring lower on standardized testing, and earning a lower GPA.

Although I had intuitively anticipated these findings for males, it was painful for my liberal colleagues to hear. At first, the Site Council members scoffed disdainfully, making jokes. One after another asked why would we do anything for white male students. One female committee member even said, “These guys may be in trouble but that’s their own fault. They’ve had all the advantages.”

Finally, I countered: “Whether we like the results or not, it’s clear that our purpose at a public school is to help those in need. And if that means white males need help right now, we need to develop ways to help them.”

All but one stared at me, either with confusion or irritation. The administrator finally mediated. She stepped in and said, “John’s right about our purpose, even if the advantages we believe males receive is true.”

There was huffing and puffing, but we carried on and generated a plan for helping white males at our high school. Then I was chosen to present the plan to the full faculty. When I finally made my presentation, I included the data sets on charts and asked teachers to keep their questions until I was finished. I explained to the faculty that boys nationally were having major problems educationally – and that although all males were highly vulnerable nationally, at our school that group of males happened to be white. I emphasized my concern about all students before explaining that the data sets at our school confirmed this trend for white males, and that we must find ways to help these at-risk students. The presentation, despite its charts and my sensitivity to the audience, went over like a lead balloon.

I was verbally pummeled by both female and male faculty members – they questioned the data, they questioned our council’s conclusions, they insinuated I was racist and sexist. They pointed out that females had more disadvantages. Not one faculty member actually asked me a question about the data charts. In fact, a couple said they could not accept our data – which must be flawed. After six or seven of my colleagues had angrily made their points, I stopped the process and offered a separate time to meet so that each concern could be addressed calmly and thoughtfully. The principal agreed right away, and the meeting moved on.

Admittedly, I had always got along well with my faculty, but this issue drove a wedge between me and many of the female teachers, even distancing some of the male teachers. But I continued on with the campaign to help those we had identified as underserved (white males), explaining repeatedly that privilege had shifted from males to females in public education. And yet the faculty and administrators still struggled getting behind it, stupidly arguing that females getting ahead was necessary for correcting past wrongs. I resisted this argument by pointing out its formal contradiction – if Title IX and feminists wanted equality, then they should be standing with me. But faculty and administrators eventually let the intervention for white males fall apart.

I decided to go to the board and seek help. Although most members seemed sympathetic, they did not offer support. I made similar arguments with them. But it was not long after my attempts to help the at-risk group of students that I began to plan my exit back to a PhD program so that I could fight for equality at the college level and perhaps one day write books on the subject. Now that I am in the middle of finishing my dissertation, I am more aware of the misandry that appears regularly in our society and schools.