What is the feminist view on single sex education?

[MummyBerryJuice]

I was educated privately in South Africa at girls-only schools largely because my parents wanted me and my brother to be educated in a multiracial setting and during Apartheid state schools were segregated. I have always felt that this was an advantage to me and the other girls as we were under less pressure to conform to girly stereotypes I never experienced any of the commonly held prejudices such as 'girls are better at English and drama and boys are better at maths and physics' etc.

However, now that I am a mum myself and am thinking about the future education of my own children (who currently are only 16 months old and in utero ) I am starting to wonder whether the separation of sexes in education (admittedly not state - which is where our children will be going) is not just another way in which the patriarchy removes women from the mainstream?

I'm not a regular poster here but I went to a girls grammar school back in the 70's and thoroughly enjoyed it. We were allowed to be ourselves and encouraged in every subject, and expected achieve the best we could. I felt I was given every opportunity to do well. The careers advice was a bit antiquated, but would it probably be a lot more rounded today.
I would send my daughter to a girls school if the opportunity arose, and she wanted to go.

That's how I feel too about having daughters. Wanting them to be able to have the freedom to choose who they are and want to be without the pressures that go along with stereotypes etc.

But I have a son (and a foetus) and I don't know if it sends the right message to boys?

And I don't think that it is right that girls should have to be educated separately to receive the same treatment and opportunities as boys. As you can see, my ideas are not yet fully crystallised but I'd really like to explore them on here, from a feminist perspective.

That is a very good question. I am about to start my dd at an all girls prep school when she is three in december (starting in jan in nursery class). I was very impressed by the facilities and excellent academic results, girls can stay until eighteen. But I handnt thought about it from a feminist perspective so will be interested to see what others think.

Gah. This is so difficult. For me it is truly an area where the theory and the practise are difficult to reconcile. Can I sacrifice my childrens' wellbeing for my principles?

I have a son and a daughter. My DP will home educate them (they are currently under 5) but I haved worked for a decade as an English teacher in a state comprehensive.

If we were to to send them to school wewould send my son to a mixed school and my daughter to a single sex school. Clearly if everyone wanted to do this the whole system would collapse.

That's always been my idea of the 'best of both worlds'. However, regardless of what we end up doing (and if we have a daughter I'll be very tempted to send her to single sex) I'd like to explore the ideas around it...

Yes, it is very difficult. Girls undoubtedly do better academically at single sex, however I can totally see the point that there is more to education than four As at A level.

I see your point about it being decent preparation for life bedlam but I never felt any pressure to conform either (well except for the 2 years I spent in a co-educational state secondary between girl's schools - and yes, the pressure did come from the girls, but it felt to me to be because of the presence of the boys that the girls exerted t e pressure, IYSWIM)

And I was far more vocal and strident about equality issues once I got to university than any of my co-educated 'sisters'.

My experience leads me to believe that I was able to form a more certain view of who I was before entering into the jaws of tertiary education (where incidentally, I was first presented with the idea that girls 'don't do physics').

Is there any actual theory out there about this though? Or is it not really a feminist issue?

I went to an all girls' grammar and it was very much geared towards being the best we could all be. Much was made of self-respect and working hard. In fact a famous female political figure was head girl there in her day! I think I did a lot better than I would otherwise have done in a mixed school.
Conversely, my brother went to the all-boys' grammar and hated it. He left with few qualifications even though he is very clever- he just wasn't suited to it.

single sex appeals to me for my daughter as I would quite happily keep her away from boys until she is eighteen! I remember being boy mad at school, co-ed, and all the arguments I had with my female friends were about boys! I do wonder if that would have been the case if I had gone to an all girls. My mother also went to an all girls school and she still raves about it and she is pushing sixty. She tried to move me to the same one after the eleven plus but I refused.

My brother did both co ed and all boys grammar in Belfast for a levels. He often says he wishes he had went to the all boys earlier as he absolutely loved it, the teachers geared classes to boys interests and he was mad about rugby. But if you look at it from the feminist perspective it probably instilled all the wrong things and he is a bit of a chauvinist and charmer!

I was always anti all girls schools. Not particularly because I thought them unfeminist but just because i didn't like the idea of segregation and always thought it was best for both sexes to mix. I went to a mixed comprehensive and couldn't really imagine doing anything different.

However, I now live in an area where literally the local state girls secondary is "outstanding" and all the other local mixed comps are struggling.

I also know that girls do better academically in single sex schools. Especially at subjects that are traditionally perceived as "boys'" subjects.

DD's only 3 but, assuming we're still living here and none of the other local schools has caught up with the oustanding girls' school, I'll be hoping she goes there.

I'm not entirely convinced it's a feminist issue though. OP, you ask whether it's just another way that patriarchy removes women from the mainstream but I'm not sure how all-boys schools fit into that argument.

I'm pro girls' schools and I do think that this fits with my identity as a feminist.

i dont think goin to a coed school automatically prepares you for dealing with mysogyny in adult life.

I went to a girl's school, started in Y9. I went to three schools before that - two in Y7 and a school for those out of education in Y8 because I wasn't in any state to go back into school at that point. Going to the girl's school at Y9 was the best thing for me.

There is a local girls school that I'd love to send my daughter to but it's private and I couldn't afford that. It goes from nursery to secondary. If there is a girl's school close enough when it's time to move school I may look for girl's schools for her.

The sad thing is girls do best in single sex school but boys need to be mixed!

There are some schools that are getting good results from part-segregation: the school is mixed but certain lessons are single sex, English being the main one. If I can find the report I'll post.

Both dh and I went to single sex secondary schools and we both decided it was definitely not something we wanted for our children. In the area of London we used to live in this would have been very difficult, and it is one of the reasons I was happy to move. Where we live now they don't have any single sex schools so it's not an issue anymore.

I'm sure there were lots of great things about my girls school, but I don't like the idea of segregation and want my children to go to the same school. One of the things I really didn't like about school was that we were (in later years anyway) all so desperate to hang out with boys that we spent time with some really fairly unpleasant lads (from the local all boys schools). I'd hope with less desperation we might have been a bit more picky!

I was amazed however when I went to a boys boarding school at sixth form at how incredibly immature and badly behaved the boys were. I don't remember at university thinking the girls from mixed schools were less opinionated than me, only that those (boys and girls) that had come straight from school were a bit naive.

Oh, and where we used to live it was the state schools that were single sex, we'd have had to go private in order to send them to the same school.

I remember someone saying that the ideal is to send your daoughters to all girl's schools nad your sons to co-ed so they can be socialized by other people's daughters!

My dd is at an all girls's school (her choice). They do incredibly well academically, and are certaily given the message that they can achieve anything. Depressinlgly, though, the misogynist stereotypes are alive and well in this all girl environment, and the pressure to look good is as strong as it is in the mixed schools in the area.

And they have to put up with being called lesbians in the bus station. Which they are currently dealing with by pairing up and holding hands. Confuses the neanderthals no end!

My DD is only 3.8 but I will definitely send her to an all girls school after Primary age. I went to a mixed school (albeit decades ago) but I truly believe that girls do much better academically and in areas of confidence in a single sex environment.

Having said that, my friend's DD (now 17) has suffered from some bullying at her single sex school and I think she would have been better in a mixed environment. I was bullied a little bit by girls at school but was sort of "looked after" by some of the boys when that happened. My friend's DD didn't have anyone when she was being picked on...

From a feminist perspective, I think it's "wrong" that we need to send our girls to single sex schools for them to get the same advantages that boys do and, while we continue to do so, things are unlikely to be forced to be changed (and it will need to be forced). So, as someone said earlier, do we sacrifice our daughters' advantages for our principles? I won't if I have the choice. I want her to have all the advantages I didn't have and then, perhaps, she will be stronger and able to make more of a difference in the world that her own children (should she have any) than I could.

"for" her own children, not "that"...

I'm not sure how single sex schools fit in with my construct of feminism, but I know I wish I'd gone to one.
The mixed comprehensive I went to was disgusting, girls were regularly sexually assaulted and if you complained to the teachers you were told it was "only a bit of fun" and that you ought to be "grateful for the attention".
Everything the girls did was through a male gaze, we had to do sport in tiny little skirts in freezing temperatures while they wore tracksuits. I was about an E cup at 15, couldn't buy a sports bra to fit me, and had to endure the humiliation of running the 400m in front of a pack of jeering boys. In class the popular girls were anxious to please the boys. The other girls didn't speak. One of my best friends from school got a PhD at 25, I had no idea she was so clever as she never said a word in class.

It will NOT be the school environment as experienced by my daughter. There is an all-girls state school a few miles away and I will apply for it. She probably won't get a place, I will be watching like a hawk for any signs of the things I experienced and the head teacher will wish they'd never been born if my DD comes home having been sexually assaulted at school.

Bloody hell, I don't think about it often these days but I'm still so angry about it. I think it's what made me dare to call myself a feminist at 18 in a mining town where feminist pretty much = untouchable.

redvelvet Wow.