News & Events
Elmwood School to host Girls on the Edge author, Dr. Leonard Sax
Tuesday September 28Respected psychologist helps parents navigate the new challenges of the Facebook age
Dr. Leonard Sax will be speaking at Elmwood School, Wednesday, September 29th, at 7 p.m. as part of the School’s ongoing Experts @ Elmwood Speakers Series. He will be sharing his insights into the challenges facing girls today and help parents develop strategies to help their daughters achieve their full potential.
In his latest book, Girls on the Edge, Dr. Sax argues that today’s teens and tweens look confident on the outside but have a dangerously fragile sense of self. The four main issues facing today’s girls are sexual identity, obsessions, the cyberbubble, and endocrine disruptors—substances that interfere with girls’ natural hormones.
Dr. Sax will speak to parents about girls’ addiction to social networking and managing their “microcelebrity” status online.
“In the U.S., girls are sending an average of 80 texts a day, compared with 30 a day for boys. They’re also spending a lot of time online polishing their brand – making themselves look thinner and getting rid of the pimples,” says Dr. Sax. “Girls today are busy attending to their microcelebrity status and presenting a persona that’s often not true or honest.”
Dr. Sax has received significant media coverage recently for his latest book. His first book, published in 2005, was entitled Why Gender Matters: what parents and teachers need to know about the emerging science of sex differences. His second book, Boys Adrift: The five factors driving the growing epidemic of unmotivated boys, was published in 2007.
“As an educator focused entirely on girls for more than a decade, I have seen how email, texting, frenemies, Facebook and managing an ‘online persona’ has become the new reality for young girls,” says Cheryl Boughton, Headmistress at Elmwood School. “This is not the world most parents grew up in, so they feel unprepared to help their daughters deal with these issues.”
Dr. Sax will give parents the tools they need to help their daughters develop healthy self esteem, a sense of identity and strong friendships. Because these challenges are being by all girls and parents, the event is open to the public and the media.
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About Dr. Leonard Sax
Leonard Sax, M.D., Ph.D., is a physician and a psychologist and the founder of the National Association for Single-Sex Public Education. His scholarly work has been published in a wide variety of prestigious journals including American Psychologist, Behavioral Neuroscience, Journal of the American Medical Association, Journal of the American College of Nutrition, Journal of Family Practice, Annals of Family Medicine, Journal of Sex Research, and others. He has been a featured guest on the Today Show, CNN, PBS, Fox News, Voice of America, NPR’s Talk of the Nation, and many other news programs, discussing the importance of sex differences in how children learn.
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