To ask if Co-Ed is better than single sex..

Life in coed schools is very different to 20+ years ago. I teach at my former secondary school do can make direct comparisons. As a student there was a small amount of bullying, name calling stuff I'm sure we all remember but I don't remember any misogyny from the boys, at least not at the same level we have now. As a member of staff, several students have been excluded for their misogynistic comments made towards me including rape threats, similarly for other female members of staff and its not particularly aimed at young staff either I'm old enough to be their mother. It isn't because the school is bad at dealing with it, they are very good but in a world where porn is easily accessible it seems to be becoming the norm. If students are happy to make rape threats and use sexualised comments to their teachers imagine what they say and do to their peers.

If I could have paid for DD to go single sex that is what I would have done.

I went to a single sex school and at the time wished I'd gone to a mixed sex one. Now I think single sex is better for girls, I bet the misogyny from boys at school could make it quite miserable

I don't have kids so excuse my ignorance. I mentioned up thread I went to a girls school. This was in the 70s/80s. Back then in my Borough (Brent) there was 4 single sex state schools, mine and a boys school were voluntary aided faith schools (RC). There was also 2 non secular schools, 1 boys and 1 girls.

In the borough I live now, there is one non secular girls school, but no boys school.

In the Borough I work in there are 3 girls state schools. One RC, one Jewish and one non secular. Again no boys schools. Is this common in boroughs/councils that they fund girls but not boys.

BTW I'm including Academies as state schools, I know they're funded differently but as I don't work in education and don't have kids I don't really understand the differences. In my eyes if the parents don't pay for it they're all state schools.

Then the problem is with those schools.

I've met a few from mixed schools who can't relate properly to the opposite sex.

Unfortunately the behaviour in a lot of mixed sex schools isn't 'normal' and wouldn't be tolerated in any other educational institution or workplace.

We should just call mixed sex schools 'normal'.

That's not a very helpful, specific or informative label though, is it? "What kind of school is St. Mary's school?" "A normal school". Normal is an unnecessarily judgmental label imo. Is a faith school 'not normal', or a special school 'not normal'? Presumably not, as they are in the minority compared with secular comprehensives.

We should just call mixed sex schools 'normal'. It's the separation that's not normal.

So let's tackle the problem at a societal level

Oh yes I absolutely agree with that in principle. I just haven't the slightest idea how that can be achieved and have no confidence whatsoever that it will be achieved. In the absence of a cure, people who have access to sticking plasters can and should use them. You can only operate within the system which exists.

"This is what I've mainly seen, but also people being uncomfortable with the opposite sex at work, which is a huge problem."

"Nonsense."

It's not nonsense that I've seen people who didn't grow up around the opposite sex be uncomfortable with them at work. And it has nothing to do with those people being twats. If you work in an organisation where the top person is a bachelor with no sisters who went to an all boys school and is uncomfortable in a room with a woman, that's a problem for you even more so than for that man.

@Fairislefandango I completely agree with your points, and they should be taken as yet another argument for addressing sexist behaviour and offences, not as an argument in favour of SS schools. There isn't a SS comprehensive round our way. Not. One. If you want SS education, you have to go the private route, and even then you have to go out of the immediate area. So the havens of civilisation are only available for people who have money. That applies to the grammar school route too (though none in our area) - because hey, tutoring. It isn't good enough. All our DC deserve better, not just the wealthy ones. So let's tackle the problem at a societal level instead of faffing about with sticking plasters that not everyone can access.

It’s a silly question as there are far too many variables to be able to say one is “better” than the other. Mine are at state girls school it’s not perfect by any means but there isn’t the widespread disruption in classrooms that Dh and I had in our mixed comps.

Also it’s not uncool to be academic as it was at our schools where anyone who worked was a swot and a square whereas now they really want to achieve.

Well.it is if the Intention is a quite life.

I hope you're not assuming that the 'quiet life' is for the teacher's benefit but not the students'.

My initial posts on this thread were supportive of parents sending girls to single sex schools, and I am, but largely because of the sexual harrassment etc that they often suffer from boys, rather than because of boys' general poor behaviour (inside and outside the classroom. Because one thing I have noticed over the last few years is the massive deterioration in girls' behaviour.

Many girls are now displaying disruptive, offensive, aggressive behaviour on a par with the boys. I can honestly say that when spacing out the disruptive kids in a classroom these days, I'm just as likely to see well-behaved boys in between disruptive girls as the other way around.

The reason behaviour is often better at single sex schools is largely because they are often not 'bog-standard' comprehensive schools in 'bog-standard' areas. Admittedly I'd still say behaviour is almost certainly better in a girls' comprehensive than a boys' comprehensive, but I doubt there are actually that many of those around.

The two girls' schools I'll have worked at are havens of civilisation because they are a top private school and a highly selective grammar school. But yes, comparable boys' schools would be a little more boisterous (but still a lot less so than non-selective ones). The girls' comp I used to live near.... not so much of a haven!

I still think it comes down to school culture. Our local all boys' non-selective has the worst reputation of any of the schools in the area, and is the very opposite of a haven of civilisation (bullying, gang violence, close to closing down). Our local coed non-selective is one of the best in the area, and parents go to huge lengths to get their kids in there. There are also other SS boys' and girls' schools which are very well regarded, as well as a coed with a very bad rep.

Apart from the fact that some of the posters here have been the girl put next to the predatory boy and complaints ignored because 'he's a boy and I'm counting on you to help him', some of us have also been around classrooms as staff. And witnessed distraught girls being written off as hysterical and making up stories for attention or being told they aren't being helpful by saying they don't want to sit next to the boys causing disruption.

I won't ever willingly work in a mixed school ever again. I'll happily work in an All Boys' school, I'll work in All Girls' schools, I love the description of single sex schools being a haven of civilisation - as soon as you take out the aspect of it being males and females in the same classrooms and the same site, both appear to become far more reasonable and well mannered, including where there is no selection on the basis of ability or income.

No we just have the children coming home panicked because they don't want to get in trouble or cause trouble but they can't do their work when their pencil case has been taken, or they can't put their books on the table, or if they dare try and put a book on the table theor work looks like shit because the table.gets kicked all lesson.

Or they accidently get placed between 2 kids who can't behave and get it from both sides.

There are actually 28 other kids besides the 2 who cant sit together. Just because they sit down and shut up amd take it doesn't mean it's a successful seating plan.

Well.it is if the Intention is a quite life.

@pointythings that is entirely what I mean. Exactly as I said upthread - SS schools are a sticking plaster only available to a small minority.

You call it a seating plan..us parents see it fir what it is. Picking quiet compliant children usually girls to absorb bad behaviour. Funnily enough its never the assertive girls who tell them to fuck off that are picked to be the buffers. Its always one that will sit there with no desk space having their stuff thrown about and their chair kicked the entire lesson without saying a word that gwts pucked for that job. Do not tell me that's a coincidence

Yes I'm sure you parents who are not in the classroom, don't know most if the kids and don't know anything about teaching a class absolutely kniw much better than teachers what is going on in their own classrooms and what their intentions and motivations are . What do I know? I've only been a teacher for 27 years. Is it a coincidence that badly behaved pupils are separated? No. Does that mean quiet girls are being 'picked' to babysit? No. In many classes I teach, it is girls who need separating from each other.

@kairouan my DDs went to our local state comprehensive and there were some incidents, but they were immediately and strongly dealt with when reported, and the boys involved invariably were the ones who had issues at home with known SS involvement. This is coming from at home and that is where it needs to be tackled - school segregation will just mask the problem. Sexualised behaviour in schools absolutely needs to be handled, but without a long term solution involving cultural change in society anything schools do will be a sticking plaster.

The problems that arise in girls only schools also need to be tackled at a societal level - which would also help reduce the prevalence of eating disorders.

The more I read of this thread, the more I think that this is far more about wider societal issues than it is about gender. Some of the descriptions on here about their DDs' experiences are just unimaginably far removed from our experience of a coed school. I'm not saying there are never any issues at all, but for the most part, the girls at our school are respected, successful and confident. God help the boy that tries to grab their breasts in a corridor, frankly. But it's a selective independent - probably similar in lots of ways to the SS schools discussed here, which are often selective or independent or both. That suggests to me that this is not predominantly a gender issue, but a broader societal/behavioural issue that is being played out through the prism of gender.

Not the point but -

I've never in my live heard anyone other than American films use the word co-ed

(Can't offer anything else as I've never known anyone who went to a single sex school)

Personally wouldn't consider single sex school for my DD. I went to one and the bullying and bitchiness was unreal. I thankfully was allowed to move to a co-ed after becoming suicidal. At the co-ed I thrived and got so much more confidence, was 1000x better.

Brave lady. But worth doing.

Co ed has been fantastic for my children (girls and boys). I would actively avoid single sex schools having seen my friends' children's experience of them but I appreciate it does depend on the schools and children.
(The boys at single sex schools I know seen to be incapable of conversing with girls normally and see them all as potential "conquests" and have no respect for girls. The girls have all struggled with friendships. My children have all had great relationships with girls and boys; the girls achieve better than his in the school but the boys all do fine).

Depends on the girl and the school of course. But yes. Definitely better for most girls.