Single Sex And Co Ed Schools: The Benefits Of Each

“The philosophy of the school room in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.” This is what the US President Abraham Lincoln’s comment on education was. We are living in an ever-growing bubble of knowledge, every now and then new milestones are achieved and new inventions are made as a result of the increasing interest in maintaining schools with programs and tailored education. Schools ever since they were established adopted different systems of teaching such as faith schools, comprehensive schools, grammar schools and even gender based schools which are called single sex schools. Each have their contribution to the society and literatures that could be good or bad depending on the background of each. However when it comes to single sex schools what it contributes are in general negative. Single sex schools is the isolation of the males/females rather than the conventional coeducation school system. 

A system or a method implied in any aspect result in a certain outcome and outcomes differ as these systems or methods differ. And so it applies on the schools that apply coeducation and segregation of students based on their sex, affecting their later life and integration of the upcoming individuals into society. It is due to the belief that males and females behave differently and thus raised up in an environment that is thought they belong to; a gender based environment. It was common before the 20th century to segregate students based on their sex, and it is still practiced in many countries worldwide, with claims by the schools and parents that this helps the students to direct their focus towards academia to attain better grades. In some Arab regions it is due to religious factors that segregation occurs, believing that having an interaction between the males and females allows for the “unscrupulous morals” (Enfilat Akhlaki) to develop, as described by many Arabs as improper behaviors being expressed as result of contact between the opposite sexes that are socially unfavorable and religiously unacceptable. In this article we will be going through the different claims and the many disadvantages of single sex based schools by presenting data from researches and scientists done that compares and provides an understanding of this phenomena.

Gender Stereotypes

“Boys will be boys” or “Girls will be girls”, blue for boys & pink for girls, men are courage & women are timid - These are some examples of what gender stereotyping looks like. By definition according to the Office of the Higher Commission Human Rights (2014) “A gender stereotype is a generalized view or preconception about attributes or characteristics, or the roles that are or ought to be possessed by, or performed by women and men.” Gender stereotype is a worldwide phenomenon and may limit the capacity of men and women to develop themselves thus affecting their life decisions. A major player that contributes to the prominence of gender stereotype is single sex school, although there are claims that it has no effect or does the opposite however disproven as we will explore into the topic. The Psychology Professor, Diane Halpern from Claremont McKenna College made a statement that evidence shows single-sex education leads to sexism and gender stereotyping (2016). With 30 years of specialization in similar fields she points on the back then recent meta-analysis and reviews of 100’s of studies that involved more than 1.5 million students revealed that the beliefs of people about other groups become more stereotyped when segregation happens other than failing to find any advantages of single-sex education. A strong argument against single sex schools is that it reduces the opportunities of boys and girls to work together in a purposeful and supervised environment. Hilliard and Liben (2010) mentioned that students are noticed to choose spending more time interacting with the same sex peers due to a message delivered by teachers unintentionally as viewed by the students an importance of a certain gender over the other in such educational systems. It is found that, in coeducational schools, the same case actually exists where girls and boys spend considerable time with their respective sexes, exaggerating the stereotypical behaviors and attitudes, however they are heightened in single sex schools where the genders are limited to only their sex, either boys or girls as mentioned in another study by Martin and Fabes (2001). It is also noticed that boys spending more time in that pattern become have increased aggressiveness as well as experiencing greater risk for behavior problems for certain boys (Eisenberg et al, 1997). 

The previous study (2001) also mentioned that the same effect is undergone by girls where when they spend more time with other girls, they tend to express greater gender stereotypes traits. This sort of education in schools limits the student’s opportunities of a wider range of behaviors and attitudes to develop. Levy and Killen (2008) show that interaction with members of other groups dynamically is effective for healthier intergroup relationships. Another research has found that the belief of students that “girls are better in language arts” and “boys are better in math” becomes stronger in the gender based schools adding to the issue of stereotyping (Fabes et al, 2013). Not only is that, but also separating males and females is considered discrimination which leads to further gaps between the sexes. In 1954 the US Supreme Court asserted “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.” Which was based on evidence that practising segregation between the white and black back then further expanded the gaps between. And since then it has been clear that integrating groups of different people allows to close in the gaps in education. (Adam Mathew, 2016). Lynn Liben from Penn State University the and Rebecca Bigler from University of Texas has further confirmed this with their findings. Children are unsurprisingly prone to feelings of being favoured from their same-sex group, and to prejudice against those that in opposite-sex groups. The same effect on children applies whether they are divided by gender, race or even by the color of the tshirt. As well as in the classroom-based study Valerie Lee from the University of Michigan reveals that the greatest expression of sexism occurred in a single sex (boys) school. This was not only limited to the boys but such behavior also observed in single sex (girls) schools where they could also foster stereotyping. (Bigler & Liben, 2006)

Impact on the Social Life

As a result of reinforcing the gender stereotypes, the path towards integrating into the society becomes difficult. Social engagement is commonly used to refer to one's participation in a social groups’ collective activities. The level of an individual’s social interaction is a factor in determining the health of the individual where participating within a certain extent is identified with improved well-being, happiness and health. Schools, being an integral part of the community shapes the society by the methodology of teaching. It quiet obvious that boys and girls behave differently but that doesn’t mean that they have to be separated. The expected benefits of coeducational environment in the schools on the social and occupational level are worth considering. Where the opposite sexes learn to play while they are young and accepting their differences allows them to inherently become more comfortable with the opposite gender, preparing them for their future endeavours. It is from the early stages that they both learn how to bridge a well-structured bridge of communication and giving way for the real life situation, where co-education schools act as a simulation or a preparatory demo of the life outside the walls of the school. It is healthier to have two different minds think rather than just one, noting that their brains negligibly differ and doesn’t impact on their learning outcome however this doesn’t limit their ways of thinking were each have their own perspective of the world thus providing distinct ideas and answers. Learning as they are growing boys and girls widens the gaps between their abilities, attitudes and decreases the mutual understanding of each other. This environment distinguishes the students from each other as Carol Martin and colleagues from Arizona State University have revealed naming it as “Gender Segregation Cycle” (2014). It is also noticed in a study that there is a greater tendency for girls to engage in sports and activities such as that include toy building when growing up with boys than girls that do not. 

As for boys it is also shown that the more time & space they share with girls the more developed their verbal ability and relational skills are. The former APA President Halpern (2016) said that “School is preparation for adult life”.Such learning opportunities are diminished by the gender based education systems and at the same time contributed to an increase in stereotyping and discrimination. Amy Novotney (2011) also questions single sex education “How can boys and girls learn how to interact as equals in the workplace if they have no experience interacting as equals in school?” Social skills are considered an integral and critical in the long life journey of the young students, from job interviews to their relationships and the everyday encounters with people, and how well their social skills and engagement is largely affected by how they were taught in the most important stage, their childhood. It reinforces the already existing negative characteristics such as gender stereotype as stated earlier, creating wider gender gaps between the two and only components of the society. Gender segregation makes it harder for students to integrate and participate in their societies. Author of “The Best of the Best: Becoming Elite at an American Boarding School” Gaztambide-Fernández says that “It's documented in 40 years of education research that what matters most about school is social life, and in coed schools, there is a positive dimension in terms of the large number of opportunities for relating to each other across gender lines. Single-sex schools shelter students from these opportunities” adding that the greater opportunity in developing well-rounded social skills is the major advantage and outcome. One study shows that mixed schools “offer students the opportunity to exchange a broad range of opinions and viewpoints with their peers since the schools comprise a mixed gender student body. In a coeducational learning environment, students are exposed to both male and female role models.” Also revealing additional advantages of which are exposure to multi leadership styles, broadened values and lifestyles, preparing boys and girls to become leaders in addition to an overall rich academic experience. (St-Laurent Academy, 2019).

Impact on Performance

An academically successful school in general is one that adopts a practical teaching system and hosts students achieving higher average grades than the average grades of other schools in a certain geography. In this section we will talk about the effect of gender segregation in single sex schools on the performance on the students that they host. One of the many claims of parents and sex segregated schools is that students perform better academically by allowing the boys and girls to focus without being interrupted by each other as a result of the interest of interacting with their opposite sex or being distracted by them (sexual instincts). However that is not true according to the study carried by the Programme for International Student Assessment (2009) revealing that on a 600 point graded reading assessment, schools that contain more than 60% girls, boys scored on average 30 points more. The same applies for girls, when 60% or more of the school is consisted of boys - scoring a higher average than when the composition is less than 60%. The results were considered of significant improvement favoring coeducation over single sex education. Another research conducted by Analia Schlosser (2011) concluded that there is an increased performance rate for all students in a classroom that consists of both genders. Specifically in high schools, classrooms that had a higher percentage of girls had the best academic achievement were girls lowered the amount of disruption in class and allows for a better student teacher relationship to build. Supporters of gender segregated also claim that differences of the brain between girls and boys need distinct styles of teaching tailored for each in order for them to perform better. However according to Kersey, Csumitta and Cantlon (2019) neuroscientists did not find but few differences between the brains of the opposite sexes, and did not link to different learning styles. MRI brain scans of 104 subjects aged 3 to 10 years old were made while watching a video on simple math topics in order to study the brain activity in each of the sexes and compare between the two. The researchers found insignificant differences when comparing between the brain activities of the two even on the level of engagement showed in the math topics presented to them - no noticeable statistical difference was present even in the way the brain of older children develop. Neuroscientist Jessica Cantlon says 'Science doesn't align with folk beliefs' disproving the claims of single sex school supporters, adding 'We see that children's brains function similarly regardless of their gender, so hopefully we can recalibrate expectations of what children can achieve in mathematics.' Having students segregated due to the belief that this will improve their performance in academics will not but rather have them loose some potential.

Solutions

Now that we have understood the outcome of single sex schools vs. mixed schools, we need to deliver this message in a more convenient and a friendly way to those who are most concerned about their children: parents and teachers. By creating an awareness program or campaign that targets them to address this issue by presenting the data with credible or influential people and personnel depending on the target audience. However this can be only possible through the ministry of education by stressing on the importance of the findings. Artists, singers, celebrities, religious figures and the like will be invited to participate in the nationwide campaign to promote co-ed education systems with the coordination of municipalities to set up for gatherings, meetings or events under that cause. Moreover, promotion over the internet and social media is also an additional step towards the goal. And then after the successful campaign, the ministry of education may be perused to ban single sex schools and allow only for mixed gender schools. As for the some downsides that mixed schools have such as subject and sport preferences and sexual distraction, these issues do not emanate from the school itself but rather from external factors that can however be addressed in the school and out of it through educating and training teachers and making reforms in the system that promotes an environment that allows for the students to become more objective to with their subject and sports preferences and also engaging parents to have an active role in empowering their children. And as for the sexual distraction, whether as young people or adults we are all prone to be distracted with our sexual behaviors which is something normal as long as it is within limits and it all goes back to how the students are raised at home and supervised at school; it’s the responsibility of both the teachers and parents. Repressing innocent sexual behaviors at a young age may amplify on the long run.