Gender Gap Widening On College Campuses

At the

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

, 60 percent of students are female, compared to 40 percent male.

Some UNC-Chapel Hill students said the trend is evident in the classroom.In one class of 20, a female student said there are just two males.

It is a typical trend at

Elon University

,

UNC-Wilmington

and

East Carolina University

where the female-to-male student ratio is roughly 60:40.

Some schools, like

North Carolina State University

, are not part of the trend. Its ratio is nearly the opposite of other schools at 40:60.

Last year

Duke University

had more men, but this fall will have more women students.

"There's more women in the marketplace, more women in high school," said George Dixon, a former admissions director at N.C. State University.

Dixon now serves as a senior consultant with the

UNC System

.He said colleges must try harder to attract more men to their campuses.

"They do view it as a concern and the difficulty is deciding what strategy to employ to try to, perhaps, reverse that trend or attract more men to a campus. The fact that the marketplace says there are not as many out there is an issue," he said.

For some colleges, it is beginning to be a real problem, and they are wrestling with ways to attract more men before the gap grows even wider.