Thurs. 9/29/11 Challenging Single Sex Ed And ‘Toxic Stereotypes’ About Our Children

Challenging Single Sex Ed And ‘Toxic Stereotypes’ About Our Children
A new study in the journal Science claims that gender segregation in schools is deeply misguided and "often justified by weak, cherry-picked, or misconstrued scientific claims rather than by valid scientific evidence." The authors write that while – of course – excellent single-sex schools exist, there’s evidence that sex segregation increases gender stereotyping, legitimizes institutionalized sexism, and thus might actually do more harm than good. The research coincides with a new like-minded book. In The Truth About Girls and Boys: Challenging Toxic Stereotypes About Our Children, Caryl Rivers and Rosalind Barnett say the parents and educators of today are being fed a diet of junk science that is, at best, a misunderstanding of the research, and at worst a deliberate fraud on the American public. Caryl Rivers is a Professor of Journalism at the College of Communication at Boston University and Roz Barnett is a Senior Scientist at the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis University.