The Debate over Single-Sex Schooling

Hour 1

A recent paper in the journal Science attacks single-sex education.  In the article, “The Pseudoscience of Single-Sex Schooling”, the authors write that the recent push for sex-segregated education is “deeply misguided, and often justified by weak, cherry-picked, or misconstrued scientific claims rather then by valid scientific evidence.” There are roughly 500 public schools that now offer single-sex classes, a significant increase from a decade ago when there were only a few which worries the paper’s authors.  But many others see value in single-sex education.  They point to the differences in the brains and learning styles of boys and girls. Today, we’ll debate the effectiveness of single-sex education.  Our guests are JANET HYDE, Professor of Psychology at the University of Wisconsin, Madison and one of the authors of the new paper, and LEONARD SAX, a psychologist, author and founder of the National Association for Single Sex Public Education.

Listen to the mp3

Listen:
[audio: 101311_100630.mp3]