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

Single sex schools can be vicious too. My DN was horribly bullied as I have said in a single sex school. Hair pulled and beaten up.

They aren't all sweetness and light.

Now she is in a co-ed she is thriving.

Nothing really works. There is no strategy or punishment which actually magically solves these problems

Except for not having girls put in a position where it's their everyday normal to be penalised for being in the same school as the boys.

At least in a single sex school, you're keeping a couple of girls that don't get on apart and not putting them in a music practice room together, rather than deciding which girl is least likely to come back down crying because the boy she was put with grabbed her breasts and he's denying it with all his mates calling her a lying whore.

I see teachers do their absolute best to try to deal with this behaviour (and all other bad behaviour) day-in-day-out. Nothing really works. There is no strategy or punishment which actually magically solves these problems. Teachers don't 'use girls to babysit boys'. They do arrange seating plans to avoid sitting troublesome kids (male or female) next to each other, because that minimises dusruption to the class as a whole. That's not 'babysitting'

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

"struggle with the concept of just being friends with the opposite sex"

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

I've never encountered this and did not experience it myself, in spite of having gone to a girls's school. The single sex school I taught at for years did collaborative stuff with the nearby boys' school (very common practice) and most of the girls did all kinds of outside school activities where they would have met boys. Plus obviously plenty of them had brothers, whose friends they met etc. It's not like they were in a nunnery.

No but maybe without the girls to use to baby sit the boys at school the teachers might actually have to start dealing with the behaviour.

I see teachers do their absolute best to try to deal with this behaviour (and all other bad behaviour) day-in-day-out. Nothing really works. There is no strategy or punishment which actually magically solves these problems. Teachers don't 'use girls to babysit boys'. They do arrange seating plans to avoid sitting troublesome kids (male or female) next to each other, because that minimises dusruption to the class as a whole. That's not 'babysitting'.

But this is a society issue, not a school issue. Some of the most interesting posts on this thread are from the PPs from other countries, where SS schools are unheard of. Why can they achieve this and we can't?

True, but waiting around for huge societal change doesn't really help with parents' decisions about where to send their daughters right now.

It's also worth pointing out that we aren't always comparing fairly when we compare single sex schools with co-ed schools though. A high proportion of single sex schools are either independent or selective schools. So there are often reasons other than sex segregation why the behaviour in girls' schools is better. I taught in one girls' school years ago and am about to start a new job in another. They are both absolute havens of civilisation compared with all of the many other schools I've taught in, although I have taught hundreds of absolutely wonderful boys over the years.

Nonsense.

I am uncomfortable with some of the opposite sex at work, because some of them are sexist twats.

Exactly or honey trapping boys, promoting self harm etc

I agree with you. I don't care whether it's an accurate reflection of the 'real world' that they will experience after school. I just want my daughter to be able to go about her education without feeling like each day she needs to protect herself. Her experience at an all girls' school is so massively different (and better) than my awful experience of school. I didn't learn to 'stand up' for myself. I learnt to appease them by not engaging. It was a really shit experience.

"struggle with the concept of just being friends with the opposite sex"

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

Exactly this. At school, my kids do sport with the opposite sex. Do lessons with them. Act in plays with them. Play in orchestras with them. Go on residential trips with them. Go to school social events with them. The vast majority of their interactions are totally mundane and non-sexual. I would far rather that than them only encountering the opposite sex in a more highly-charged social environment.

Agreed, DDs who go to single sex schools seem way more obsessed with boys and put them on a pedestal. All they do is talk about where to meet boys, how to talk to them and struggle with the concept of just being friends with the opposite sex.

Depends on the school. Depends on the kid. In my experience as a teacher there's a lot less bullying in single sex girls schools, girls do hold grudges for longer than boys though, so fall outs tend to last a lot longer!

"The role of schools are to educate not to provide a microcosm of working life!"

The role of school is to prepare you for adult life. If it were just about the education you could be home educated, but school is much more than that.

I've met quite a few people from single sex schools who can't relate properly to the opposite sex. Not healthy at all.

But are people saying that girls should only peck on the cheek at that age? Really?? Is it a case of hope to god that they're not doing anything sexual at all until the age of consent, and then all bets are off?? Girls of 14/15 are developing sexually, just as boys are. Trying to prevent them from having any sexual experiences at all until they're 16 or 18 is repressive. Of course, some girls won't want to do anything at all yet, which is obviously fine. But some girls will, and that's fine too. They needed to be taught and empowered to control their sexual experiences and to enjoy positive sexual relationships as appropriate, and I don't think that only encountering boys in a social context is the best way of doing that. Nor is it going to stop them. FWIW I'd done a fair bit more than a peck on the cheek by age 16, and I was at a SS school.

A couple of posters have mentioned separating the sexes for maths and science and I’d quite like to know the rationale for that.

I went to a girls RC school. (Comprehensive) At 11, I hated boys and was happy to go to a girls school.

I don't have kids, but if I did I definitely wouldn't send them to a faith school. Girls v coed I'm in 2 minds about.

Girls do better in maths and sciences in single sex schools. But school is not about academic achievement. I was so shy around boys, they were like aliens to me. It took a long time to treat them normally.

I was in secondary school in the 70s/80s and we weren't offered stuff like metalwork or woodwork, just cookery and needlework! Obviously that is rightly illegal now.

I have heard of some schools that are coed but boys and girls are taught separately at least in sciences/maths which I think is a good compromise.

If she does go to agirls school, I would suggest extra curricular activities like scouts, drama etc to get her to mingle with boys.

@NeverDropYourMooncup true, plenty to time to get to grips with nature later!

And.....?

I don't wear uniform to work. I choose my job based on things I'm interested in and good at and don't spend most days learning things that are completely irrelevant to my job. I choose my own hours rather than working 8.50 to 3.25. I work alone and not with 30 other people crammed in a tiny room. I don't have to address my manager as sir. I don't have 13 weeks holiday a year. I dont study for exams. I don't have to do compulsory sport several times with my colleagues within my working week and then share a shower with them. I can go on!

The role of schools are to educate not to provide a microcosm of working life!

I've attended both. It's difficult for me to say as I loved the single sex school, and the camaraderie, but I made some excellent
male friends, I'm still in touch with, from my co-Ed school.

I think possibly single sex just edges it from the education point of view. There was a stronger element of competitiveness, as has been mentioned, and it's easy to get caught up in that, I found.

You’ve missed out quite a lot of stuff that could happen between ‘peck on the cheek’ and ‘full on sex’. I also don’t think it’s that rare to have sex at 14/15. I was nearly 16 towards the end of year 10 (upper end of the range you gave) so almost at the legal age of consent.

I’m not for one second saying that this is right, but pretending that it doesn’t happen is doing girls a disservice. If you think they are only pecking a boyfriend on the cheek at that age then you are turning a blind eye to the many other things they may be experiencing from/with boys both with and without consent.

@NeverDropYourMooncup

Well said.

I went to a single sex girls school and wouldn't turn back if I had the choice. My closest circle of friends now are still ones I made at school (we left 10+ years ago) and I did extremely well in my GCSEs.

They really cracked down on uniform, make up, nails etc across the school in my 2nd year and dished out a lot of detentions. It caused a bit of uproar from the students to start with but it was the best thing they could have done for us all.. I personally became very comfortable in my own skin, we all knew and loved each other for who we were, and without boys around and these tighter rules it just stopped the girls all competing against one another over silly things.

Our sixth form was then mixed with mostly boys that had attended the local all boys school. They were probably excited to finally be around girls after 5 years without... unfortunately for them they were greeted with a pack of girls that hadn't worn make-up and been bothered by our appearance for years and still appreciated the extra 10 minutes in bed in the morning, we would openly talk about periods, cramps, thrush etc very animatedly in the common room and had zero time for any of the lads that thought they'd try playing us against one another because of our pack-like solidarity. I still did extremely well in my A-levels in a mixed sixth form, but put a lot of it down to the values my single sex high school had taught me.

Reality is that this girl will most likely experience boys rubbing themselves up against her and talking about erections and anal whilst showing one another pornography on their phones by the end of the first term.

Evading the forceful groping of older boys during lesson changeovers where it's not possible to see in the mass of students.

Boys trying to get into the girls' changing rooms for PE and commenting upon her breasts as they go past for a PE lesson.

Asking why she wears a bra if she hasn't got large breasts during English lessons.

Drawing cartoons of her.

Sending messages asking for nudes. Saying they'll tell everybody she sent them if she refuses.

Having to make sure she's never alone in a part of the site where there aren't any security cameras.

Not being able to leave school on her own because the groups of boys target girls on their own.

Then there are the 'little relationships' where there's pressure to give the boy proof she likes him. Maybe some images of the boy that are illegal for her to have.

And if she is seriously assaulted, there's the knowledge that there will be snapchats of the attack being shared.

Maybe it is a bit unnatural for girls to be free of the constant sexual harrassment and threat of assault in an education environment when it's perfectly normal for it to go on all the time from 11 years old everywhere else. But having seen both versions (and experienced it myself - it's nothing new - boys will be boys, after all), I now think there's something to be said for unnatural.

Girl's schools often have worse bullying than co-eds! My daughter has been in private co-ed schools since reception (she's now in secondary) and I was actively looking for co-ed schools. I find it unnatural to separate boys and girls and my colleague who had his daughters in single sex schools just switched them to co-ed because of the awful toxic environment.