Blog: Drop in Boys' Participation: A Blip, or Cause for Concern?

This summer, for the first time ever, there were more female athletes in the U.S. Olympic delegation than there were male athletes. That caused a ripple of geeky excitement among the sports statistics nerd population. We wondered whether it was a fluke, or whether it was actually a trend we'd see reflected anywhere else.

Well, as it turns out, we didn't have to wait very long, and we didn't have to look very far; in fact, we only had to wait a few weeks, and look to our local high schools. The National Federation of State High School Associations just released its annual Sports Participation Survey, which as it has every year for more than two decades, shows more kids playing sports than the previous year. But there's a twist to the 2011-12 academic year's all-time high of 7,692,520 participants - the gain is attributable to a significant increase among girls' participation (an additional 33,984) that more than made up for a 9,419-participant drop in the boys' figures.

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