Friday, April 25, 1997

Time for the sons

I declare the fourth Wednesday in April 1998 as "Take Your Son to Work with You Day."

The daughters had their day yesterday. They have had their days for the last five years. They will have their day next year.

Now, it is time for the guys.

This is not a one-gender-is-better-than-another situation. It is a let-one-gender-get-equal-treatment issue.

The young women's day we observed yesterday has really caught on. We got just about as many calls at the office telling us that such-and-such company had some girls at work as we do on snow days telling us they have snowmen in their front yards.

A Roper Starch Worldwide Poll last year found that almost 50 million adults said their company or their spouse's company participated in the day. That's up 12 million from 1995. More than 132 million said they believe the day is a positive experience for the girls who participate.

Leaders of the national movement said the day has helped improve the relationship a lot of girls have with their parents. They said some girls were surprised to find that their mothers and other successful women in the workplace had some doubts in their own lives, but still are successful.

Of course, the idea of having a boys' day is not original with me. In fact, Superintendent Cecil Davis and other administrators in the Wylie Independent School District combined the celebrations and declared yesterday "Take Your Child to Work Day."

"Here on the kindergarten-first grade campus, I saw five or six students with their parents (teachers)," Davis told me. "Several helped in the classrooms. One of our maintenance men here had his son with him. They were both out front repairing a fence."

The organizers of the national effort - the Ms. Foundation for Women - don't like the idea of mixing the genders.

Lauren Wechsler, a national spokesperson for the organization in New York City, told me the day is specifically designed to help girls' needs.

"Boys and girls have different developmental needs. Boys are in crisis at ages 5-8. They have learning disabilities and use Ritilan a lot. That's when they need intervention," she said.

"Girls at age 9-15 are just hitting puberty. They really become sexualized. People are looking at their physical attributes. They have eating disorders. We started the day to keep them healthy and resilent.

" 'Children's Day' defeats the purpose. It short changes both. It tells girls they are not important. When girls gain, it doesn't mean that boys lose. The Ms. Foundation for Women supports 100 percent separate days."

I think the young men should have a day of their own.

Anyway, if you combined the two days, no one would show up for school.