The problem with all-girl schools (and all boy schools) vs co-ed schools is one of curriculum, particularly in the adolescent grades and above.

Not every girl (or boy) fits into the typical gender-based interest spectrum. A girl sent to an all-girl school will never be exposed to subjects like auto mechanics to even find out if that interests her.

Teens girls in all-girl schools also tend to be more boy-crazy. When they have boys around them all the time, they see that a percentage of them are hormone-crazed creeps, not anything to be desired. It is important for teen girls to understand boy-thinking, so they don't think they have to go to bed with their first dates. The only way to understand that is to see lots of boys, rather than to have boys be a rarity in their lives, only interacted with in a dating context.

The people who do these studies about girls faring better in all girl schools are studying this from a liberal arts academic perspective. They usually find that girl students get higher grades in maths and science when there are no boys.

But one is not sending boy or girl children to school only to become better academic acheivement machines. Children and teens need to be raised to be whole people, because that is what counts in your real life, not whether you got a 4.0 gpa or a 3.79. I mean really, now that you are an adult, when was the last time anyone ever asked you your HS gpa? You are judged in real life by what you do, not what academics you did long ago.

What is needed are more male educators in the primary and junior high school levels, to understand boy-thinking in co-ed schools. Female teachers try to make the boys behave in girl ways, and judge boy-behavior as mis-behavior. When the boys don't sit still and act as passively as the typical girl student does, they see the boy as being bad.

When boys are no longer judged by predominantly adult female perspectives, they will not be seen as mis-behaving versions of girls.

This is exactly what happened to me. The teacher who was most helpful to me in elementary school was the one male teacher I had in 7 years of school.

Thanks for nicely pointing out the ANNOYING limitations of this article.

Brilliant, though somewhat serious given the strange spin on the original. I suspect you may be taking the author literally.

>>What is needed are more male educators in the primary and junior high school levels, to understand boy-thinking in co-ed schools.<<

Schools don't pay enough to get male teachers...or even really strong female teachers. Any real improvements over current standards will require better teachers.

Ironically, boys are performing better under the new "female-centered" curriculum. Academically, boys have shown a marked improvement in the last twenty years. They simply haven't improved as much as girls under the same curriculum.

If only the distinguishing difference were that between 4.0 and 3.79...

There is one flaw in your logic that a lot of others here share. It is the assumption that female teachers necessarily respond most favorably to female students because they are female. Most teachers are not lesbians and are therefore not likely drawn to femininity and its traits more than masculinity.

If female students get more positive regard from teachers of all genders it is because girls are generally more cooperative both in terms of behavior and study habits. I am a teacher, btw.

I find that many female teachers are too easily wooed by the charms of male students. That sounds icky, but that's not what I mean. I think female teachers tend to favor male students, except when said student is a burden.

On the other hand, male teachers live in perpetual fear of being seen as favoring female students . . . .again because of all the icky stuff we see on sensationalistic news programs about the occasional but rare aberrant teacher. Most male teachers, for instance, will not correct a female students for breach of dress code. That fear does not translate to the opposite scenario.

Boys present difficulties in the classroom because they are more restless, whether that is nature or nurture. It does present significant challenges to the task of learning. Boys also read less. There is data I could dig up for you on this point.

Right on!

Sorry, right on the the first thread is what I meant.

The article sucks. I'm the Dad of a little princess and also a little ball of boyhood. The author's sarcastic suggestion to charge an extra fee to school boys because they are more trouble is insulting the extreme. FU. Without rambunctious boys, who would drop smart bombs on Saddam Hussein, or put gang members in handcuffs, or stand up to sanctimonious pussies who want their children growing up inside a test tube? One writer had the excellent point that growing up with boys teachers girls, who are soon to be young women, all their stupid male tricks. If only society were just the author's way, Nirvana would be ours. If I knew my daugter would never be pushed around in life that would be great. I don't believe we live in that world, so I want her to grow up knowing what real life is like. Oh, and there are a few boys who were once respectful, smart, and caring and made school a better place. They grew up to be men who make the world better too, not just complain about it.

Perhaps if the article author had sons instead of daughters the article would be completely different. At what age does the author think males & females should begin interacting w/ each other w/o 'damaging' the girls? It is completely unrealistic to prevent them for mixing in school. When they graduate & get a job it is unlikely they will work w/ only 1 sex. Ideally according to the author they would be separated everywhere while growing up. Whatever happened to diversity enriching people? It is boring to just be around people just like yourself all the time.

both for boys and girls, I think you are misled about how girls' schools (especially good ones) deal with coursework. If anything, these schools succeed in emphasizing math and science -- areas traditionally thought of as "for boys."

At our local all-girls school (which my daughter attends), they start working with tools (hammers, screwdrivers, drills) in elementary school.Basic strucutral engineering is one of the 10th grade science electives, and physics and calculus are key components of the education. Fully half of the 2007 graduating class is going on to college with declared majors in science/math/tech fields traditionally thought of as male.

The advantage these schools may have over dual-gender schools is that girls who are more susceptible to math and science anxieties can get over those issues more easily without boys. (I say may because I am unaware of any research supporting it. I can say that it certainly is the educational theory at work).

I met my wife in 3rd grade elementary. If all schools were single-gender, my love life would've been ruined.

No it's not a joke...I'm serious.

(Very thought-provoking input.)

One of the deepest regrets I have regarding my life is that I did not do better in school. Years after trying to do anything to get out of school, eventually dropping out and getting a GED, I found that I could do markedly better in college.

The difference was more freedom, less mindless repetition of things I already "got," whether in "homework" or in class, more involved and interested teachers and more focus on understanding rather than repetition. Teachers in high-school verbally and emotionally ATTACKED me when I showed any intelligence, seeing this as a threat to their petty egos. Instructors in college eyes' lit up when I engaged them. I had teachers in college compare my work to the Mona Lisa, while in high school I would get sent to the library or the principle for the same stuff.

I always wonder what I could have been if I had had a good education and been encouraged earlier. Unfortunately I did not have the money to continue college. When I was about 26 years old, I realized that I was intelligent. In public school, instead of encouragement and engagement I got repetition and abuse: I was made to think I was stupid every time my eyes lit up and I opened my mouth.

When I read the comments about how boys disrupt education it makes me sick. Our education system is terrible. The fault doesn't lie with the boys, it lies with a retarded system and the retarded parents and administrators and politicians who have made our education system a hell for anyone with any innate intelligence and genuine desire to learn.

Shame on the people blaming the problems with our schools on the boys suffering through it, rather than the parents, teachers, administrators and politicians too stupid to realize that our public education does not FIT the people it is supposed to teach.

No wonder more often than not a CEO, manager, anyone "successful" is more a mindless yes-man twit than a real thinker. The real thinkers learned in public school that only people who excel in our society only excel at repeating back 1,000 times what they are told, without any thought of their own.

And the utter injustice that I should have to read the blind insults of thoughtless twits that say boys ruin education for girls!

I learned the quadratic formula in high school. About ten years later I actually saw something it was used for. Why wasn't I showed what it was used for in school? Because mindless twits like all of you blaming everything wrong with our education system on children are too stupid to actually have any idea how to teach anyone anything...

My IQ is in the top 90-100 percentile of everyone in the United States. I took an very long online IQ test a little while ago and I found that in a few areas no-one else who had ever taken the test had done better than me. I wish I had been allowed even a little of the pride I got from knowing that when I was in public school. Instead I was led to believe I was stupid. Well I'm not as stupid as the people who would ever say that the problem with our education system is the children.

I am the mother of 6 boys and 2 girls. I have 7 brothers. I did very well in school, far better than my brothers did, though we are all athletic and gifted. I married a man who later became a teacher and has a master's degree in curriculum development. We understand from several studies that our present school system is primarily set up to accommodate the female mind, not the male, and that without meaning to, male students are treated in a discriminatory way simply because our society is not as accommodating nor as accepting of normal male behavior, particularly in the early years. While more male teachers in the primary grades could be helpful, this is not necessarily the right way to go about things. The system is the problem, and gender segregated schools are simply a serious viable option, not because our girls need any kind of protection necessarily, but because it would allow the programs to become more suitable to the individual needs that being a particular gender would require. We have chosen to home school our children. Our boys are excelling in their academics, as are our girls. They love being together and home with mom. There is a security within them that other children seem to lack, and it is my personal opinion that taking children away from the full time influence of a loving parent too early may actually be more of the cause of the distress our children experience in attending school than anything else. In the early days of education, children did not even go to school until they were 8 years old, and they already knew how to read when they went. Their mothers taught them. I think though it is nice that our society allows for women to have careers and opportunities to do other things other than just raising children, but it may be more that we perhaps do not fully understand anymore just how noble and important and personally satisfying it can be to be full time mothers. I think our children far and wide, gender issues aside, would benefit from longer periods of nurturing within the walls of their own homes before being sent out to integrate into society and try to maintain one's own values at the same time as learning to be accepting of the values of others. Of course, this opinion is limited to homes where abuse, neglect, and mental illnesses such as chronic depression in the mother are not an issue.