Degree Gap Sets New Record of 571,000 This Year; Do We Really Need Hundreds of Women's Centers?

The chart above shows the Department of Education estimates for college degrees by gender for the Class of 2010 (data here). For associate's, bachelor's and master's degrees, women will receive 1.823 million college degrees, which will be 571,000 more degrees than men will earn (1.252 million) this year.

Just ten years ago, the overall degree gap was "only" 366,100 college degrees in favor of women, so the degree gap has increased by more than 200,000 in a decade (see chart below). The biggest gain for women has been the increase in the degree gap for master's degrees, which has almost doubled in the last ten years, from 73,472 in 2000 to 134,000 this year.

Question: Given the "degree gap" of 571,000 college degrees for the Class of 2010 in favor of women, can we really justify spending money (with some taxpayer funding in the case of public universities) to fund almost 200 women's centers on college campuses around the country (list here)? For example, the Women’s Center at the University of Minnesota advertises that it "serves as a catalyst for the University to achieve equity for women." At least in terms of college degrees, that happened 29 years ago back in 1981 (see chart below).