To wonder if an all girls school will be hard when it comes to teen relationships?

135 replies

Scarletbutnotohara · 02/05/2021 01:50

Wasn’t sure how to put the actual question so apologies if it sounds a bit odd!
DD is currently at a co-Ed prep, and will be starting at a single sex grammar in September.
As someone that went to a co-Ed comp, single sex schools are completely new to me (and DD obviously) I have so many memories of my school days and many of those memories involve boys. First crush, first ‘relationship’... not only that side of it but also the fun and friendships I had with both the girls and the boys.
If you went to a single sex school, how did you meet boys? And when you did, were you comfortable around them? Parents of girls in single sex- do you feel the lack of interaction with the opposite sex is beneficial and less of a ‘distraction?’ Or do you feel there are more negatives to not being educated together?
I’m not worried about it, as such, just more intrigued as to what to expect.
DD attends some extra curricular clubs, but they are mostly girls. Plus, the grammar has a lot of extra curricular clubs that she is likely to be join, so obviously all girls again.
It’s unlikely she will stay in touch with the boys from her current school.....

OP posts:

Scarby9 · 04/05/2021 22:28

@toconclude 🙂 I have happy memories - I think I hit lucky...

DIYandEatCake · 04/05/2021 22:48

For what it’s worth, I went to a mixed comprehensive and am hoping to send my daughter to an all girls school. The experience of teen relationships with the opposite sex that I got from my mixed school was relentless verbal, physical and sexual abuse, from years 7-11. It wasn’t until the sixth form that I had boys as friends, and finally had a boyfriend. It was a fairly rough school, and I was a quiet and studious kid, but it was miserable and not a life lesson that had any value. I think so much depends on the culture and ethos of the school (the one I’m hoping to send my daughter to us very inclusive and has brilliant pastoral care).

paralysedbyinertia · 04/05/2021 23:09

I was chatting to dd about this thread earlier and asked her if she has ever felt that boys try to dominate or take over in class, especially in maths and science. She laughed and said that the ones who are intelligent enough to rival the cleverer girls are too conscious of not wanting to look sexist to talk over them, and the ones who would probably love to dominate are too stupid to have anything to say anyway. So that's my 15yo's take on it. FWIW, she loves being in a co-ed environment.

I have been struck by how many of dd's female friends are planning to do science and maths A-levels. I'm not sure if this is just her school or a wider national trend. I would also be really interested to know if there is any very up-to-date research on outcomes in single sex schools and co-ed schools to see if things have changed.

Pinkyavocado · 05/05/2021 00:39

I’d send my daughter to an all girls school in a heartbeat if there was one. She’s year 10. She not fussed about boys yet but every single argument and fall out at school involves boys. I thought all the drama would have died down by now but sadly not. She’s going through hell at the moment because one girls ex boyfriend fancies my daughter. She has no interest in him but it hasn’t stopped the nastiness and bullying.

bitheby · 05/05/2021 00:53

I went to an all girls school, joined in year 9, was painfully shy and struggled to make friends. I didn't get invited out with anyone so I didn't meet boys until I went to university.

I hated it. Much preferred the mixed school I went to before we moved. I had lots of friends there - boys and girls.

BoomBoomsCousin · 05/05/2021 01:41

@paralysedbyinertia

Girls overtook boys in STEM A levels nationally in 2019 (though your DD's school may still be ahead of the curve).

There seems to be very little good research on single-sex schooling, sadly. I believe it's considered hard to do now because single-sex schooling is much more tied to other factors and it's hard to get large data sets that are comparable and not skewed. (Whereas there are a few good studies of outcomes for kids from the 50s when single-sex schooling straddled economic, geographic and religious groups).

deyhuggy · 05/05/2021 05:48

I went to a single sex girls school. My school experience was great - no distractions, minimal pressure to look a certain way/impress boys, made friends that I still see now that I'm in my 30s, we were taught to be strong feminists etc. We had a twin single sex male school that we paired up with and attended combined dances/social events for so we had some male interactions.

I do however wonder if it has had an impact on us as we've aged. I have a strong friendship group since high school of 7 girls. 3 of us went to have relationships/marriages/DCs. The other 4 have never had relationships at all (even sexual/casual relationships). I'm wondering if this had anything to do with going to a single sex school. The overwhelming majority of my single female friends went to single sex schools.

One huge negative for me about a single sex school was the lack of sex education or any education relating to relationships etc. (Catholic school and parents didn't give me any sex ed). So most of us as teen girls were clueless about sex, relationships, contraception, consent etc. which lead to a teen pregnancy for one of my friends and made it a bit harder for us when navigating dating at uni. If you are sending your kids to a single sex school and there is no sex ed, I would ensure that you educate them yourself as I think that was the biggest issue for us

fiveminutebreak · 05/05/2021 07:20

Went to a single-sex state school and then a co-ed sixth form. It was actually pretty great not to have the distraction of boys, bearing in mind this was the 80s, and I really hope things have changed now, but it meant there was no: this is 'for girls' and this is 'for boys' .. so we got proper attention from the teachers, without feeling like we had to 'compete' - don't know if that still happens or not. I was also very shy, and I think I would have found school even more intimidating if I'd been with boys, unfortunately. So it worked for me.

I would send my DD to a single sex school, I wouldn't send my DS to one though.

I met boys at youth club, friends of friends. I didn't have my first boyfriend until I was 16 though (which seems young to me now, definitely didn't feel that way then!)

paralysedbyinertia · 05/05/2021 08:13

That's interesting @BoomBoomsCousin. I can see why it might be difficult to collect valid data on single sex schools these days.

Instinctively, I feel that things are probably different now. When I was at school, I definitely felt at a disadvantage in science - not actually because of having boys in the class, but more because of sexist teachers who treated the girls differently. I was discouraged from doing physics because I might be the only girl in the class (I wasn't, and I wonder how many more of us there might have been if they hadn't tried so hard to put us off), and the teacher would make us watch the experiments instead of letting us do them ourselves. DD's experience has been so different. I don't feel that she has been held back at all.

Personally, I think the £9k university tuition fees are probably making quite a big difference too. As a young girl, I was definitely socialised to study what I was interested in, without really thinking about future job prospects. In those days, having a degree in anything was good. My dd has a very different take on it - she wants the university experience, but if she is investing tens of thousands of pounds in it, she wants to know that it will lead to a solid career at the end of it. So I definitely think times have changed.

paralysedbyinertia · 05/05/2021 08:15

@deyhuggy, I don't think any school would be allowed to get away with doing no sex ed these days. I certainly hope not!

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