Daniel Tomlinson
February 4, 2009
English 101

Single sex schools is a talked about topic because there are mixed opinions on the subject. People believe that single sex schools help the students get a better and higher quality of education because there isn’t the opposite sex in the classroom to distract them and affect their behavior. Other people believe that having a single sex schools doesn’t help the student’s social skills because everywhere in the real world you have to deal with the opposite sex all the time and you aren’t sheltered from them.
In the article “With no Boys to Ogle, We had time to Learn” by Christine Flowers she talks about how she went to an all girls school and she thinks that she received a better education because she didn’t have boys to worry about all the time. She was able to focus on her studies and not worrying about getting dates for the weekend. Christine said she was able to not hold back anything she wanted to say in class because of a boy sitting in class and her thinking he was good looking or her just being intimidated by the boy. Christine herself taught at an all boy school and she said they focused better on their work between 8 and 3. Christine believes that schools are becoming schools with both sexes because they are focusing on money instead of trying to deliver a higher education to the students.
Sean McCollum in “Single-sex schools: Solution or setback?” talks about how having single sex schools can be a setback for the students and the economy. Sean thinks that it isn’t the schools that aren’t giving a very good education; he thinks the teachers just need to be trained to handle the different sexes differently. He says that boys aren’t going to want to discuss certain things and girls aren’t going to want to do different things and teachers need to be trained to handle those different things differently. Sean also talks about how the just girl schools were doing alright and the boy schools were almost becoming a place for boys that were acting out to go. Boys were going to all boy schools because they were acting out not because they wanted to receive a higher education. He also believes that single-sex schools don’t help the students with social skills. Because one day they will have to interact with the opposite all the time everywhere they go, going to a single-sex school doesn’t help their social skills with the opposite sex.
Christine believes that single-sex schools are the way to go and Sean believes that they have a place but a single sex school isn’t the only way to get a good education. He believes that if teachers were trained differently than they would be able to handle the different sexes differently making them learn better. While Christine believes that single sex schools are the best way to achieve a really good education. Christine says that boys and girls should mingle outside of school at social places not in school. Sean believes that single-sex schools slows down the kids learning of social skills, and they are important because both sexes interact all the time in the real world
Views on this topic are split because people have different views on ways to achieve a good education. Many people feel that single-sex education isn’t the way to go because they cost more money and you risk the social skills of the students attending the school.