Not only is it a bad argument, it starts from a completely false hypothesis - the universities I graduated from had excellent programs which assumed no previous

Not only is it a bad argument, it starts from a completely false hypothesis - the universities I graduated from had excellent programs which assumed no previous knowledge and I know that the best universities in EU have the same, if not higher, standards. Also, something to think about: since the founding of the uni I got my MSc degree from, less than 3% of first-year students were women. You could count them with your fingers. The problem starts really, really early in a kid's education.