Mixed Gender vs. Single Gender Schools

Close

Magali Sanchez

Magali Sanchez

I believe that mixed gender schools are better and more beneficial for students. Students are young and school is the main place where they learn and develop their social skills. It is where they learn to adapt to different types of environments that they may encounter now and in the future.

“Co-education creates a feeling of comradeship. I advocate teaching both genders in the same institution without showing any discrimination,” said the Greek philosopher Plato.

LAUSD has recently opened an all girls school The GALA in Mid City. They plan on opening an all boys school on the campus of Washington Preparatory High School in 2017-2018, according to dailynews.com

A mixed gender school expresses more diversity within the school and it teaches equality. Students will be able to express themselves as they wish, being a girl, boy, transgender, nonbinary, gay, lesbian etc. Some may feel scared to express themselves or come out when going to single sex school because they might feel like they don’t fit in.             At mixed-gender schools, students get equal opportunities for learning. Boys and girls and everyone in between will be taught and treated the same with no sex preference. Students are graded and evaluated on the work they submit, not on what their gender is.             Working together in the classroom and on homework assignments provides boys and girls the opportunity to learn from each other intellectually, as well as socially, according to stac.school.nz.

It is not yet scientifically proven that single sex schools like The Gala are more beneficial for them. It may provide the student with more attention but it does have a down side to it. When students go to a single-gender school, they are not as socially equipped to interact with the “mixed-gender” society, according to a report on the website Mental Health in Schools at UCLA. They miss out on vital interactive skills they get when interacting with the opposite sex. They will have trouble and may need some time to adjust to the real world when they leave their schools.

Not all teachers are specifically taught how to teach in a single gender environment. They also don’t have specific technique training on how to teach or approach something with a single sex classroom, according to Niche.com

Single sex schools are not the real world because people aren’t only going to interact with people of the same sex or gender. Once someone leaves the school it will be a whole another world out there. Kids should be learning to coexist with each other from the time they start school and not be segregated by gender, because the day they enter school is the day they enter the real world.

“Education is not a preparation for life; education is life itself,” said philosopher and educational reformer John Dewey.