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Let’s Go, Fellas
By Avery | July 31, 2007
In the few minutes that I have before two-a-days start, I may do some real research into single-sex schools. Being in the middle of the action, it seems clear to me that a lot of our kids need some addition by subtraction. In this case, the subtraction of the distraction of attraction. Now, do I think that single-sex education is necessary in every case? Not at all. And maybe it’s not even the ideal way to educate most students. Even if that’s true, though, for many Black kids, we’re not at the point where we can afford to talk about ideal methods. We’re at straight-up crisis stage. I know. I see ‘em every day. And the skill levels are…well, it’s a crisis.
Even as I think through this, I know that there are some feminist organizations that would have a problem with single-sex public schools because of the spectre of segregation, but I think that’s looking at things through some idyllic lens rather than looking at what’s really going on down here on the ground. Statistically speaking, using DC, because that’s the district I know best, girls are more likely to graduate high school and several times more likely to graduate college than boys. Frankly, I think that single-sex ed wouldn’t be harmful to girls either, but it’s clear that the boys need some help. And again, it’s not about whether this is ideal. Maybe it is the best way, maybe it’s not. But what I know for sure is that with the numbers being what they are, there should be absolutely no potential solution that’s not on the table. Better to try something that may work than to keep slogging through with what’s not working.
But like I said, this is all off the top of my head, before I’ve done a shred of research. If the evidence tells me something different, I’ll follow, but it would have to be really convincing.
Topics: Everwhatever |
July 31st, 2007 at 10:11 pm
A lot of women’s orgs have no problem w/ it. I used to work at the American Association of University Women, who made big point of girls not being called on equally in class, or encouraged to go into the sciences. Some women felt girls’ schools and girls colleges freed them of that.
The subject came up at a family dinner a few years back, and even some of the youngest adults at the table, who had attended coed h.s.’s, agreed that at some point, the genders can do better w/o the sexual tension. Not all kids, but an option.