Should Gender Segregated Education be abollished?

[Zor]

In modern, Civilized nations Gender segregation in public schools has been irradiated in favor of Coeducation. However, there are still Vestiges of it remaining in private schools.

The Question here is simple, should these remaining Gender segregated private schools be forced to open there doors to the other gender and why?

In my opinion, Gender Segregation in Education should be abolished for the following Reasons...

1-It denies them opportunity to interact with the other gender early on in their life making them less conformable around the opposite sex. When they go into the workplace employers will put people together regardless of gender which will lead to inadequacies.
2-Gender Segregation in my mind has little difference to racial segregation, accomplishing little more than deviling "Male" and "Female" into different Camps. Woman are physically diferent and do think Slightly differently than men, but the last thing civilization needs is more "Us and them" thinking.

Zor

[Alan Bolte]

To clarify, you are referring here strictly to entire schools that are one-gender-only, and not to schools which in some classes at certain grade levels separate the genders in order to avoid common discipline problems, correct?

[Darth Wong]

In modern, Civilized nations Gender segregation in public schools has been irradiated in favor of Coeducation.

Oh for fuck's sake, it's "eradicated", not "irradiated". A mere typo I can tolerate, but this is fucking ridiculous.

[Metatwaddle]

I was a bit skeptical of this idea at first, but your second point convinced me, because I can't stand the "men are from Mars, women are from Venus" mentality, and it makes sense that gender-segregated education, by its very existence, is going to emphasize the differences and not the similarities between the sexes.

It's not going to get abolished, though. It's pretty popular, and it persists even at the undergraduate level.

[Brother-Captain Gaius]

Without shiny co-edness, I wouldn't be able to meet hot chicks here.

[Rogue 9]

For public schools it already is, but for private schools, at least in the United States, there would be multiple legal issues in doing this, namely that the government cannot interfere with a private organization's freedom of association. The most that could be done would be the withholding of federal funds from a gender-segregated school.

[Uraniun235]

Obviously, co-ed instruction at young, impressionable ages has led to the development of a degenerate, immoral society. Clearly, it is co-ed education that must be abolished. However, as the sinners have enacted blasphemous laws that defy the holy word, we are legally unable to take segregated education to the full extent of only hiring instructors of the same sex.

Therefore our course is clear: Robots must teach our children.



I can't help but wonder if a lot of people wouldn't start home-schooling their kids if sex-segregated schools were outlawed, and I'd personally much prefer that kids go to a sex-segregated private religious school than attend home-schooling; at least with the former, there's still some exposure to unscreened ideas and influences from schoolyard chums.

[WyrdNyrd]

At least part of my screwed-upness, even this late in life, can probably be attributed to the boys-only primary- and high-schools that I attended.

Tear them down, I say!

[The Guid]

I think one needs to be in a mixed environment for a lot of your life but I think between certain ages it can boost concentration and performance to be put into a single gender class. No I don't have any evidence for this, but its not as if others have evidence for single sex schools producing wierdos etc.

[WyrdNyrd]

Err, Me!

Yeah, yeah, I know, anecdotal, and self-diagnosed, to boot.

But as I was not a social teen at all, it meant that I had practically no exposure to girls at all until I got to university, by which time I was even more socially awkward than your normal 18-year-old. I was given an involuntary crash course in dealing with women, and guess what, I crashed!

[The Guid]

I would agree that by 16 you need contact with the opposite gender, as per your example but the topic suggests that all gender segregated education should be abolished which I disagree with.

[petesampras]

In the uk single sex schools significantly out-perform, on average, mixed schools in terms of academic results.

Of course, there is more to a childs development than getting good grades.

[The Guid]

Plus all the single sex schools will be privately owned and therefore almost better by default due to the fact they can kick out troublemakers.

[Cairber]

I LOVED being in a girl only school. And it wasn't like we didn't interact with guys...there was a guy only school across the street (our "brother" school...we did most charity events and fund raisers and other activities with them). But being in a girl only atmosphere allowed for more of us to feel independent. Theres tons of studies out there showing how girls will participate more in class if they are alone without boys. I can recall having many conversations about the benefits we felt the school had; most girls said they enjoyed not having to "doll themselves up" and that they felt more empowered to speak up at Nardin than they did at their co-ed elementary schools. The athletes agreed, most of the time, that not having to compete for attention with the boy's teams was also a great benefit.

[WyrdNyrd]

Oops, I'd forgotten that this issue was not symmetrical across gender.

In the past I've also heard that girls prefer not having to try to impress the guys. I've also heard that some "smart" girls feel pressured to underperform, so as not to "scare off" guys that they're interested in, by appearing too brainy. We all like 'em bare-foot-and-pregnant-in-the-kitchen, not acting like rocket-scientists, don'tch-know?

All in all, relationships, especially at that young age, can be a major distraction from learning. OTOH, social interaction such as this can be as valuable a lesson as the official subjects.

I guess, despite my own, biased, distaste for the idea of SS schools, it's not really clear-cut at all - good arguments exist for both sides.

[Xenophobe3691]

Oops, I'd forgotten that this issue was not symmetrical across gender.

In the past I've also heard that girls prefer not having to try to impress the guys. I've also heard that some "smart" girls feel pressured to underperform, so as not to "scare off" guys that they're interested in, by appearing too brainy. We all like 'em bare-foot-and-pregnant-in-the-kitchen, not acting like rocket-scientists, don'tch-know?

You think you're being facetious by poking fun at that. My sister is one of the smartest people in her class, and she has a shit ton of trouble because of it. All the guys find it intimidating that she's smart, hot, and can give back lip. (Yes, I called my sister hot. Mainly because every guy keeps saying that. UGH!)

[1123581321]

I said no because I don't like the government telling private organizations what to do without a damn good reason, which I don't think gender segregation in school is one. Let the fundies have their bone, and keep the government out. After all, you never know when an idiot like GWB is going to be the government.

[RedImperator]

In the short time I've been working in a high school, I've noticed a marked difference in the behavior of girls in evenly mixed classes and classes in which boys are a small minority. I've seen girls who are very opinionated and demonstrative among other girls get very quiet when boys are in the class. I've also noticed that it's far more likely that a few boys will dominate an entire classroom than a few girls (I see this in my classes at Penn, too, where women outnumber men 3-1 in the educational program but a small number of the men--myself included--tend to dominate classroom discussion). I don't think complete gender segregation is good for social development, but I can see some educational merits to gender segregating classrooms. Something like Cairber's situation seems ideal--separate schools for academics and atheltics that are close enough to allow daily social contact between the sexes.

As for the government up and up outlawing gender segregated private schools, that's simply unacceptable. There's no good reason to do it and the government can't just ignore the right free association because it conflicts with its social engineering priorities.

[Admiral Valdemar]

From all the studies I have seen and heard about, separate sex classes improve the performance of boys even more so than girls. Mingling at nursery and primary school level, yes, but at secondary education I believe keeping the sexes separate at class time is best for both sides. Girls tend to be somewhat of a distraction to adolescent boys.

[The Guid]

The only thing is I think by sixth form one needs to in a mixed education or else one can turn out a little overwhelmed by the opposite gender once one reaches University or whatever post school occupation one has

[Gil Hamilton]

People can do what they will and I don't think such places that are girls schools or boys schools should be shut down. It's their deal. However, I really enjoyed my co-ed high school. Somedays I think I would have gotten up at an unholy hour in the morning if I didn't know I was going to a place filled with pretty girls.

[Guardsman Bass]

I voted against this, but mainly because I feel that a private school should have the right to decide who they are admitting for students, within a certain degree.

I don't know what an all-boys' school would be like, since I've been co-ed my entire life.

[NecronLord]

I went to an male-only school between ten and sixteen. Didn't do me much harm when I moved. Barring that numerous girls said I was unusually comfortable around women. This however, I blame on living with female cousins.

[kheegster]

To propose banning single-sex schools, one has to show that it causes significant damage to the development of a child. I don't see any no major cons against single-sex schools, so I don't see why they should be banned.

In any case, even if one is studying in a single-sex school, it doesn't mean that they are disallowed from associating with the opposite sex outside school.

[tharkûn]

All the academic data I've seen points toward sex segregation being benificial, at least for academics.

Frankly I see nothing wrong with giving parents choices, particularly if they are willing to pay. I also doubt the arguement that if you don't have co-ed classes in school you will be unable to work in a mixed gender environment in the real world. First there is college, where one hopes teenagers become adults and learn real life skills. Second I have yet to find anyone outside of a boarding school who doesn't manage to have co-ed activities socially, through churches, through community organizations, or just by dating.

I've seen no evidenced harm (and no, being unable to watch the cheerleader who wears the uniform to class doesn't cut it) from gender segregation at the teenage years so I'm against banning it. I see evidence that suggest gender segregation might be benificial, so I'm open to greater implementation, but I need more data and a better look at ramifications.