All Girl Schools Disadvantage?

Girls at single-sex schools may succeed academically but at a huge disadvantage if they are unable to talk to boys, says Richard Cairns.

12:08 07 January 2016

Girls at single-sex schools may succeed academically but at a huge disadvantage if they are unable to talk to boys, says Richard Cairns, head of Brighton College.

 

Richard Cairns, head of Brighton College, said that single-sex schools were a “deeply unrealistic world.” He explained that although they may provide the tools needed for the students to succeed academically, they are left unable to talk to opposite sex, which could be a problem when they finally go out and join the work force.

 

He added that female pupils at Brighton College, a co-educational private school, were “"non-plussed when they read press reports about their supposed inability to thrive because they are sitting next to boys in class".

 

He added: "There is something, I feel, much more common to schools that educated both boys and girls, and that something is kindness," he added.

"Boys in single-sex school tend to create their own artificial hierarchies where only those in the first-15 rugby team are truly valued, while girls-only schools sometimes suffer a degree of emotional intensity that can lead to bullying.

 

"Contrast that with a co-educational world where girls admire the boys who dance, sing or act, and so, therefore, do the boys. Contrast that too with a mixed environment where the emotional intensity of all girls is diluted by the boys.

 

"In other words, there is a place for everyone and an environment where girls and boys can be themselves."