BY KRISTA RAMSEY
The Cincinnati Enquirer

This week, when the school bus stopped at our house, I climbed on with my daughter.

Since the beginning, I've participated in Take Our Daughters to Work Day. This year, I propose something equally important: Go With Our Daughters to Work.

Whether they're 6 or 16, they hold down their own jobs, from classes to sports to after-school work. Often, adults don't understand what pressures they face, or how to support them.

As my 6-year-old Jessa told me, ''It's really, really complicated. You think it's just hop on a bus, write in a journal, do a math problem, go to gym and music, then go home. It's really a lot more than that.''

Hoping for enlightenment, I spent part of a day in Jessa's first-grade class, part with gifted girls at Bethel-Tate Middle School and part with Princeton High School student Anna Dickson.

Instilling confidence

I came away buoyed by girls' confidence. They are utterly brimming with their own possibilities.

Even in first grade, they are strikingly self-sufficient. They move comfortably through class routines, read their own directions and manage classroom jobs.

They have the same opportunities and get the same encouragement as boys, they say, and they wrinkle up their foreheads when you ask about differences.

''Boys wobble around more, and talk to each other more,'' says Mary Plona. ''Boys don't know how to sit with dresses or skirts on,'' says Amanda Hatfield.

Jenni Kissinger notices that occasionally girls and boys segregate themselves. ''I don't see girls playing baseball or football very much. We have boys' lines and girls' lines when we go to lunch.''

But none thinks gender will limit anybody.

''When I'm 25, I would be a mommy, and I would be gentle and kind and nice,'' says Kim DeLong. ''If I had a little girl, I'd name her Polly. And if I didn't have children, I would be an artist.''

''You could do both,'' says Hannah Myers. Kim smiles. ''I guess I could,'' she says.

Seeking more opportunities

At Bethel-Tate Middle School, gifted seventh-grade girls assured me they've had the same academic opportunities as boys, maybe better. They say they're called on and encouraged as much as boys, and usually do better academically.

But if they could change one thing, it would be more opportunities and recognition in sports. ''When you turn the TV on, it's always a guy's sport that's on,'' says Holly Dyer. ''In classes, girls are just as smart as guys, but in sports it's as if girls don't really matter,'' says Jennifer Harp.

Asked to describe themselves, Jennifer says happy, Holly says independent and Joanna Yinger says, ''confident, and I get more confident as I get older.'' But Heather Burns says, ''The older I get, the less confident I get. I feel I need to be accepted.'' Amber Bretland says she is quieter. ''When I was young, I just said things openly, and didn't worry. Now I keep things to myself and worry more.''

Princeton High School sophomore Anna Dickson has always spoken up for causes she believes in. She wrote a protest letter when boys got to play a basketball game against male teachers, but female teachers and students didn't.

Now, her openness depends on her audience. ''I change my views depending on other people,'' she says. ''If other people disagree, usually I don't speak my mind. But if I start the conversation, then I can't turn back - I have to speak my mind.''

She says she has had the same academic and athletic opportunities as boys, but says female athletes get less recognition.

''The boys' stands are full. Ours are empty. I think in high school, it gets easier for girls just not to play. It's not like anybody would miss us.''

Anna, who works four days a week at a chili parlor, wishes adults recognized how hard teens work. ''It's hard to keep everything in balance,'' she admits.

One of the revelations of my day was just how much today's girls want it all.

I ask my daughter how her life will go. ''I think it's going to be mystical and, whatever way you look at it, I think it's going to be good,'' she says. ''Sort of like that man (Picasso) who painted those women with all those sides to them. I'll have all these different sides, and they'll all be good. ''

Krista Ramsey's column appears in The Enquirer on Saturdays. Write her at 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202 or fax at 768-8340.

RAMSEY ARCHIVE