Things (hardly) no one will ever do again: Have A Single Sex High School education

   Vicki and I both attended single-sex high schools: Westlake for Vicki, Benson Polytechnic for me. Both are co-ed now. There are still single-sex high schools: about 400 public and 400 Catholic.

Vicki went to Westlake because it was a great private school. I went to Benson because it was the best public school in Portland (admission was based on grades and recommendations, as opposed to proximity), and because it was all-male. And because it had a 250-watt AM radio station. I was shy and awkward around girls, wanted to go to MIT, and felt I would be less distracted in an all-boys school (not to mention more able to become a broadcaster).

Research says single-sex education results in less socialization: students don’t learn to work with and befriend members of the opposite sex. Probably, based on my experience.

I went on to what was, at the time, essentially an all-male college. MIT was 10% women in the class of 1974. I loved MIT women, loved being around them. Still, many of the same problems there. Now that it’s 50-50, I am sure things are better.

 

Comments

[Clark Smith]

In my application to Student House, the only coed living group at tech at the time, I mentioned that coming from an all-boys school, I was interested, as part of my college education, to practice living with women "as people." Perhaps that got me in.

Am I the only person bothered by the inability of English speakers to use the terms "sex" and "gender" appropriately. When you wrote of single sex education, I thought at first you meant instruction in homosexual techniques.

While we're on the subject, I recently got a questionaire that asked "What is your current gender?"

[pschindler]

You’d think a professional journalist would know the difference. Benson was called homo
High, and yet we received no instruction in that subject. Your reason for applying to Student House was precisely the same as mine; I just don’t remember if I mentioned it.

Paul Schindler