As the president of one of the nation’s oldest women’s colleges, I must voice my concern about the recent reports from the American Association of University Women (AAUW), which have received a considerable amount of coverage in the Tribune (Main news).
The authors, reversing a six-year trend in their own research, claim that single-sex classroom experiences for girls do not provide a remedy for gender-equity problems.
It seems to me very likely these findings will have repercussions for single-sex learning environments at the higher education level and also in the private sector of education. An impressive body of research points to the fact that women’s colleges are more beneficial to students when compared to the coed setting. How are we to resolve the contradiction between the higher education research and the new AAUW findings?
Single-sex “experiments” throughout our educational system offer a diversity of choice. Although the vast majority of students will continue to receive an education in coed settings, the single-sex classroom offers a life-changing option for girls and women when the “fit” is right.
I believe the conclusions stated in the AAUW report encourage us, no doubt unintentionally, to turn our attention away from issues of gender equity in education and away from searching for creative solutions. If anything, teachers and professors today need a greater awareness of gender in teaching, and parents need more strategies and options when it comes to educating their daughters.
I encourage educators, parents and students to continue exploring single-sex learning options. By offering alternatives, we will improve the education system for everyone. Only after we have tested these approaches much more thoroughly will we generate the research that truly and accurately measures their effectiveness.
