My high school decided to abide by NY state regents standards, so we had the same curriculum as any other high school. We also had around a dozen AP classes.
The better thing about single sex education is that girls are always excelling in the AP Chem class. A girl is always valedictorian. The girls' sports teams are the most popular ones. It's a culture that necessarily celebrates the achievements of female students, which instills confidence. THEN you also have the benefit of not being distracted by boys. We did have an all-boys school down the street though.
Post by omgzombies on Feb 27, 2015 22:33:53 GMT -5
I think same sex schools can be great but they were not for me.
Anecdote time!: I went to a really small/elite private all girls school in Middle School, and it was awful. I was sent to the school councilor by one of my teachers for not being "happy" enough, what they meant was not bubbly or perky. Apparently sarcasm was not very ladylike. Yes they focused on math and science, but I never felt like they focused on team building, and i don't remember there ever being a focus on being proud to be a girl.
Middle school is kind of the prime age for learning social politics, and learning how to "other" people. It's just a rough time to plunk a girl into an all girls school. It didn't help that I was a year younger then everyone, so I was probably more socially immature, and it was very apparent I was not as physically mature. I was friends with the few other girls who were outcasts, but those three years were hellish for me.
I think high school or college would be much more beneficial for that sort of thing.
Another all-girls catholic high school attendee here. I loved my experience and what Kerry Washington says really resonates with me. Boys were just not a point of focus until after school. Like a pp said, girls were the leaders. Our examples were girl student body presidents, girl scholarship winners, girl sports and academic achievers, etc. I know I want DD to go to an all girls' high school too.
Post by cherryvalance on Feb 28, 2015 7:00:51 GMT -5
I went to an all girls Catholic high school and it was the best decision I could have made. My parents allowed me to tour that school and another Catholic, co ed school, and I was surprised that I felt so at home there. I was much more confident when I graduated than I would have been if I went the coed route. Although I have issues with Catholic school in general, single sex is an option I'd love to have for my kids.
It's interesting to read this as I feel like my co-end school was very important to my academic success. We were all treated equally and enjoyed competing with the boys,we also used to laugh at the girls who came from single sex schools to events we had and how they were all dressed up and in awe of the boys who we just found normal. I do think a lot of it is due to school culture - it was cool to be bright and work hard at my school and it was an academically selective school.
I think this is the quality that one should aim for when selecting a school. DH's high school was like this, and co-ed, and the ambition and sense of community that came from that environment are still with him today. Even in my horrible waste of a public high school education (huge drop out rate, and a community that was generally derisive of education) we had a small class of honors kids where this was the overall feeling. It's so wonderful to be around peers that are pushing to be their best, and are pushing you to do the same.
I went to an all girls boarding high school and I really believe it has played a large part of my confidence around my all male colleagues.
I definitely attributed to my loudmouth ways. I was very insecure in middle school. Once I was in a small all girls school I found my voice.
I also have found myself in situations later in life, like jobs or college activities, that were majority male. I often didn't even notice I was the only (or one of the only) women at first. So far from being stunted around boys, I think I learned confidence. I didn't even date much in high school, or have sex, despite the catholic school girl image! But when another woman says to me, "is it weird being the only woman in x?" I never feel like it is!
I am interested in learning more about single sex education, maybe it would have been helpful for me to gain more confidence. Do they typically teach in different ways than a co-ed school? I did well with the traditional way of teaching math and science.
My best answer to this question is "sort of."
I spend a couple hours a week entering grades on the computer and printing reading booklets for the girls in DD's class so I get to quietly observe the class quite a bit. It seems to me that the teacher is more conversational in class than I recall from when I was a student. There is a lot less lecturing to the kids and more give and take between student and teacher. The teacher often sits in the middle of the room and they just gather round and chat about Jamestown, or landforms or The Constitution. I think this would be less likely to happen with boys in the class.
The girls all do quite well at reading, spelling and grammar so they spend much less time on that in class. As a result, they have more time to spend on math and science. boys tend to be more left brained and need extra help with things like spelling and grammar. If they were I the class, the teacher would need to divide time equally between language skills and STEM skills instead of focusing on mostly STEM for the girls. I think over at the boys school, they spend more minutes per day on language skills. Also, girls tend to be moe language based learners while boys tend to be more visual. It slows the teacher down if she has to explain everything in both words and pictures. Obviously, when they are doing long division, the teacher writes it on the board. but when she is talking about the difference between igneous rocks and metamorphic rocks, the girls understand with words, whereas the boys need pictures. With history, the girls listen and retain dates whereas boys tend to need the teacher to write the dates out on the board. I don't mean to make it seem like boys just slow down the girls, I'm sure there are things they are just whizzing through over at the boys school that the girls spend more time on.
DD's class studied Vikings earlier this year. They enjoyed it so much they wanted to dig deeper into the topic by writing and putting on a play. The girls worked on the play and presented it during their lunch/recess. (The teacher gave up a weeks worth of lunch breaks to help) I doubt this would have interested the boys, since it was voluntary and not a required assignment. I know the teachers at the boys school will spend extra time building models or whatever it is the boys like to do when they take a special interest in a topic.
The last difference seems to be the relationship between the girls and what it means academically. Like I mentioned before, the girls are very competitive but they also really help each other out. They are all very good friends, there is not one single girl in the class who is on the outside of the inner circle. The entire class is an inner circle. So they want to help each other out. If boys were in the class, I thin it would be more of a "this little twosome" and "that little threesome" rather than an all-for-one mentality. With all the girls helping each other out, they learn better. They are supportive so they are not afraid to ask each other for help. In DD's class, Alaina is the one to go to for math help, my DD is a walking dictionary so she helps with words the girls don't know, Lily is the resident artist and will help draw pictures for assignments, Kathleen is the best Athlete, Caroline likes science and animals and on and on. If you are part of a small clique, you can only get help for a smaller number of area. But when you have a whole class of best friends to help you out, you've got all the topics covered. And one of the best ways for the girls to reinforce a subject is by teaching it to someone else. I think with boys in the class, there would be much less unity and more of an every man for himself type attitude. From what I hear, thinks are just as cohesive in the boys school and they have quite a bit of academic camaraderie, as well.
My high school decided to abide by NY state regents standards, so we had the same curriculum as any other high school. We also had around a dozen AP classes.
The better thing about single sex education is that girls are always excelling in the AP Chem class. A girl is always valedictorian. The girls' sports teams are the most popular ones. It's a culture that necessarily celebrates the achievements of female students, which instills confidence. THEN you also have the benefit of not being distracted by boys. We did have an all-boys school down the street though.
A woman will always be student body president, and vice president, and treasurer. A woman will always be the one with the AV cart. DJ on the college radio station.
Not only is it a culture that celebrates the achievements of female students (which is totally true), but just the fact that if stuff is going to happen, it's going to be women/girls getting it done...
A lot of the negatives I'm seeing in this thread don't really come to pass, at least I've not seen them. There's way LESS competition (in terms of looks or boys or whatever) among the students than there would be in a coed environment... there was NEVER pressure to 'look good' at all at my school. You'd roll into morning classes in your jammies, it simply didn't matter.
...and before I went there, I had exactly ZERO close female friends. I didn't get along well with girls. I was the girl who had a bunch of (gay, but whatever) male friends. That was one of the reasons I chose a womens' college - I knew I needed to get along better with women.
Post by mominatrix on Feb 28, 2015 10:48:29 GMT -5
I wonder: Do we feel as positive about single-sex education for boys?
When I was in law school/early in practice, there were huge legal issues around colleges for men (namely state military institutes The Citadel and VMI)... I came to know and work with one of the lawyers who represented Shannon Faulkner, the plaintiff in The Citadel case.
...I dunno. I was pro-coeducation in those cases, mostly because it seemed as though the type of education offered (rigorous military instruction, but not a military academy, state-sponsored) was fairly unique, while the mainstream liberal arts curriculum that's the bread-and-butter of Womens' Colleges is fairly common. Also, private schools, rather than state ones.
I'm less inclined to be pro-coeducation for primary, middle, or high school, though... based on some academic studies (that may or may not be long out of date, 20 years later) that seemed to point to boys and girls having better academic and social outcomes in single sex environments.
but I worry that I'm splitting hairs, and really should have been all about supporting VMI and The Citadel...
I am interested in learning more about single sex education, maybe it would have been helpful for me to gain more confidence. Do they typically teach in different ways than a co-ed school? I did well with the traditional way of teaching math and science.
My best answer to this question is "sort of."
I spend a couple hours a week entering grades on the computer and printing reading booklets for the girls in DD's class so I get to quietly observe the class quite a bit. It seems to me that the teacher is more conversational in class than I recall from when I was a student. There is a lot less lecturing to the kids and more give and take between student and teacher. The teacher often sits in the middle of the room and they just gather round and chat about Jamestown, or landforms or The Constitution. I think this would be less likely to happen with boys in the class.
The girls all do quite well at reading, spelling and grammar so they spend much less time on that in class. As a result, they have more time to spend on math and science. boys tend to be more left brained and need extra help with things like spelling and grammar. If they were I the class, the teacher would need to divide time equally between language skills and STEM skills instead of focusing on mostly STEM for the girls. I think over at the boys school, they spend more minutes per day on language skills. Also, girls tend to be moe language based learners while boys tend to be more visual. It slows the teacher down if she has to explain everything in both words and pictures. Obviously, when they are doing long division, the teacher writes it on the board. but when she is talking about the difference between igneous rocks and metamorphic rocks, the girls understand with words, whereas the boys need pictures. With history, the girls listen and retain dates whereas boys tend to need the teacher to write the dates out on the board. I don't mean to make it seem like boys just slow down the girls, I'm sure there are things they are just whizzing through over at the boys school that the girls spend more time on.
DD's class studied Vikings earlier this year. They enjoyed it so much they wanted to dig deeper into the topic by writing and putting on a play. The girls worked on the play and presented it during their lunch/recess. (The teacher gave up a weeks worth of lunch breaks to help) I doubt this would have interested the boys, since it was voluntary and not a required assignment. I know the teachers at the boys school will spend extra time building models or whatever it is the boys like to do when they take a special interest in a topic.
The last difference seems to be the relationship between the girls and what it means academically. Like I mentioned before, the girls are very competitive but they also really help each other out. They are all very good friends, there is not one single girl in the class who is on the outside of the inner circle. The entire class is an inner circle. So they want to help each other out. If boys were in the class, I thin it would be more of a "this little twosome" and "that little threesome" rather than an all-for-one mentality. With all the girls helping each other out, they learn better. They are supportive so they are not afraid to ask each other for help. In DD's class, Alaina is the one to go to for math help, my DD is a walking dictionary so she helps with words the girls don't know, Lily is the resident artist and will help draw pictures for assignments, Kathleen is the best Athlete, Caroline likes science and animals and on and on. If you are part of a small clique, you can only get help for a smaller number of area. But when you have a whole class of best friends to help you out, you've got all the topics covered. And one of the best ways for the girls to reinforce a subject is by teaching it to someone else. I think with boys in the class, there would be much less unity and more of an every man for himself type attitude. From what I hear, thinks are just as cohesive in the boys school and they have quite a bit of academic camaraderie, as well.
Didn't they come out with something recently that disproved this? That it was just one of those things that was generally assumed, and because of socialization it tends to be more true, but that girls and boys are actually about equal in terms of language and math and science. Does anyone else remember discussing this? I could just be crazy and making shit up.
Post by orangeblossom on Feb 28, 2015 10:54:32 GMT -5
mominatrix. I think all-boys schools have their own advantages. I know al of of the charter all-boys high schools have had phenomenal successes.
As far as the Citadel and VMI, I think there were right to become coed, for exactly the reasons you mentioned. Students can get a unique education there, that they can't other places. It's the reason many all-boys public schools that had a specific emphasis like math and science, became coed where vs. all-girls school, where you could get a college-prep education at many other schools
I went to a coed public school but I absolutely see the value in single sex education. I am generally pro public school while DH is adamant our kids will go private. But the single sex aspect is one of the things I really like about the private schools we will consider when the time comes.
I went to co-Ed public school and was always very pro public. DH only wanted single-sex private, like he had. When we were thinking about where to send our oldest child, we thought we could be sent overseas for a work assignment. So we made most of our decision based on the assumption that DD would have to transition to an international school overseas for a few years. We needed a school with a faster paced curriculum so that DD would be at the same academic level as her same age peers when she went overseas and also when she transitioned back home. The fact that it was all girls never really entered the equation, it's just what was available to us with the curriculum we desired.
But after experiencing single sex education, I'm a convert. I wish every kid in America could experience it. Since DD did have the opportunity for co-ed in k through 2, I can see how this year in 3rd grade has been different for her. All else is the same, same school, same girls, same curriculum, etc. The only difference is that the boys are separated from the girls starting in 3rd grade so that is what I am attributing much of the change in DD to.
My high school decided to abide by NY state regents standards, so we had the same curriculum as any other high school. We also had around a dozen AP classes.
The better thing about single sex education is that girls are always excelling in the AP Chem class. A girl is always valedictorian. The girls' sports teams are the most popular ones. It's a culture that necessarily celebrates the achievements of female students, which instills confidence. THEN you also have the benefit of not being distracted by boys. We did have an all-boys school down the street though.
A woman will always be student body president, and vice president, and treasurer. A woman will always be the one with the AV cart. DJ on the college radio station.
Not only is it a culture that celebrates the achievements of female students (which is totally true), but just the fact that if stuff is going to happen, it's going to be women/girls getting it done...
A lot of the negatives I'm seeing in this thread don't really come to pass, at least I've not seen them. There's way LESS competition (in terms of looks or boys or whatever) among the students than there would be in a coed environment... there was NEVER pressure to 'look good' at all at my school. You'd roll into morning classes in your jammies, it simply didn't matter.
...and before I went there, I had exactly ZERO close female friends. I didn't get along well with girls. I was the girl who had a bunch of (gay, but whatever) male friends. That was one of the reasons I chose a womens' college - I knew I needed to get along better with women.
This definitely existed in my same sex school. Not necessarily looking the "prettiest" but wearing the right brand of jeans, shoes, carrying the right backpack. But it was a pretty snooty ass school. People definitely looked at me funny when I told them we didn't go skiing in Europe over vacation, that my family went camping instead. Quite obviously I still have a pretty big chip on my shoulder from dealing with those kids.
Post by loreleigilmore on Mar 1, 2015 8:14:42 GMT -5
I am always shocked that girls wanted to downplay their intelligence. That was never an issue for me. I liked school and I studied with both guys and girls.
I hope I can instill in my daughter the pride in her intelligence and not to be afraid of being smarter than a boy. It hurts my head that I would even need to think about that.
One thing I would be interested in knowing, and I have not researched this at all, is how single sex education affects each sexes ability to thrive in mixed company later in life? Does the confidence remain high or does it taper off? Does it affect competitiveness in careers?
Post by ChillyMcFreeze on Mar 1, 2015 9:25:24 GMT -5
I work at a women's college (PDQ) and I wish I'd known about women's colleges when I was applying to college. The level of discourse in the classroom is heads and shoulders above what I experienced at my large state school. The students want to be the smartest and the they want to come to office hours. Many of them are very tuned into looks and popularity, but its just different without the sexual politics in play. One of my faculty friends does call it Neverland, though, because some of our students never seem to grow up. Gender diversity is still diversity, and they do miss that part of their development into adulthood when they're with us. (There are other coed colleges in town, but we don't have regular contact.) that's the one real pitfall I see, but their intellectual growth and freedom make up for a lot of that "stunted" socialization.
Interesting. I could see where not having one for girls could be an issue. The all-girls public schools that have remained, have been able to do so because there are other college-prep programs in the city, while the all-boys specialty public schools (e.g. math and science), had to admit girls.
I am interested in learning more about single sex education, maybe it would have been helpful for me to gain more confidence. Do they typically teach in different ways than a co-ed school? I did well with the traditional way of teaching math and science.
My best answer to this question is "sort of."
I spend a couple hours a week entering grades on the computer and printing reading booklets for the girls in DD's class so I get to quietly observe the class quite a bit. It seems to me that the teacher is more conversational in class than I recall from when I was a student. There is a lot less lecturing to the kids and more give and take between student and teacher. The teacher often sits in the middle of the room and they just gather round and chat about Jamestown, or landforms or The Constitution. I think this would be less likely to happen with boys in the class.
The girls all do quite well at reading, spelling and grammar so they spend much less time on that in class. As a result, they have more time to spend on math and science. boys tend to be more left brained and need extra help with things like spelling and grammar. If they were I the class, the teacher would need to divide time equally between language skills and STEM skills instead of focusing on mostly STEM for the girls. I think over at the boys school, they spend more minutes per day on language skills. Also, girls tend to be moe language based learners while boys tend to be more visual. It slows the teacher down if she has to explain everything in both words and pictures. Obviously, when they are doing long division, the teacher writes it on the board. but when she is talking about the difference between igneous rocks and metamorphic rocks, the girls understand with words, whereas the boys need pictures. With history, the girls listen and retain dates whereas boys tend to need the teacher to write the dates out on the board. I don't mean to make it seem like boys just slow down the girls, I'm sure there are things they are just whizzing through over at the boys school that the girls spend more time on.
DD's class studied Vikings earlier this year. They enjoyed it so much they wanted to dig deeper into the topic by writing and putting on a play. The girls worked on the play and presented it during their lunch/recess. (The teacher gave up a weeks worth of lunch breaks to help) I doubt this would have interested the boys, since it was voluntary and not a required assignment. I know the teachers at the boys school will spend extra time building models or whatever it is the boys like to do when they take a special interest in a topic.
The last difference seems to be the relationship between the girls and what it means academically. Like I mentioned before, the girls are very competitive but they also really help each other out. They are all very good friends, there is not one single girl in the class who is on the outside of the inner circle. The entire class is an inner circle. So they want to help each other out. If boys were in the class, I thin it would be more of a "this little twosome" and "that little threesome" rather than an all-for-one mentality. With all the girls helping each other out, they learn better. They are supportive so they are not afraid to ask each other for help. In DD's class, Alaina is the one to go to for math help, my DD is a walking dictionary so she helps with words the girls don't know, Lily is the resident artist and will help draw pictures for assignments, Kathleen is the best Athlete, Caroline likes science and animals and on and on. If you are part of a small clique, you can only get help for a smaller number of area. But when you have a whole class of best friends to help you out, you've got all the topics covered. And one of the best ways for the girls to reinforce a subject is by teaching it to someone else. I think with boys in the class, there would be much less unity and more of an every man for himself type attitude. From what I hear, thinks are just as cohesive in the boys school and they have quite a bit of academic camaraderie, as well.
Hmm..in this case I don't think I would be for it. Apparently I learn like a boy.
Eta: I don't have concerns socially. I get along well with women, when I had friends they were always girls. I was not interested in boys, appearances, or being popular. My concerns were largely people thinking I wasn't smart or was a bad person.
The concerns I have with same-sex education is the above, that the academics will rely on things like "girls are good at language, learn by listening, and want to act things out while boys learn by doing and want to make models."
I attended an all-girls boarding school and DH attended an all boys school.
I'm torn about what to do with my boys. We both loved the single sex environment, but there have been some studies that have basically said that men from all-boys schools tend to be sexists ass-holes (not DH).... I don't want to raise sexist assholes ;-)
Interesting. I could see where not having one for girls could be an issue. The all-girls public schools that have remained, have been able to do so because there are other college-prep programs in the city, while the all-boys specialty public schools (e.g. math and science), had to admit girls.
I wonder how this will turn out.
Agreed. I think a lot of DC girls could benefit from same sex ed, so it be cool if they made a girls school too
I have a gut no reaction to single sex education but it's not from any personal or reasoned basis. Just a gut feeling. So take that for what it's worth.
I am always shocked that girls wanted to downplay their intelligence. That was never an issue for me. I liked school and I studied with both guys and girls.
I hope I can instill in my daughter the pride in her intelligence and not to be afraid of being smarter than a boy. It hurts my head that I would even need to think about that.
One thing I would be interested in knowing, and I have not researched this at all, is how single sex education affects each sexes ability to thrive in mixed company later in life? Does the confidence remain high or does it taper off? Does it affect competitiveness in careers?
I don't think it affects it much at all, at least not in my experience. For us, we had regular contact with boys. We shared a common yard, and could interact before school and at lunch. We caught the bus together. The only time, it was all boys, was during school hours. Some of our sports, we even competed with boys.
IME, the confidence has remained, and many of my friends are at the top of their game in their careers and very competitive.
I'll say the only thing for me, is when I went to college and had more male friends, it definitely took awhile for a friend to be just a friend, and me not to have more than friendly feelings towards them. Not all guys of course, but the ones I was really close to. I got into some weird situations, where there were a few male friends everyone thought we were together, but were not.