The most surprising aspect of Canberra Grammar School's decision to become fully co-educational from 2017 is that the school's Bishop-in-Council, the Right Reverend Bishop Stuart Robinson, and board of directors waited as long as they did before acting. England's better-known private schools, all of which began life as boys-only institutions, have been enrolling girls since the mid 1970s. Rugby, the setting for Tom Brown's School Days, went co-ed in 1995. Indeed, separate-sex schools are now solidly in the minority in most liberal democracies.
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Some parents of Grammar boys have been justifiably angered by the suddenness of this decision and by the board's disinclination to canvass the matter with the wider school community. But principal Justin Garrick's justification – that it will better prepare its students to live and work in a world where women play an equal role – is self-evident. Other considerations such as enhancing the school's socially progressive credentials and allowing parents the option of sending their sons and daughters to the same institution – would have been influential in the board's thinking too. And at the back of Dr Garrick's mind would have been the need, nay requirement in an increasingly competitive market, for Grammar to be able to cast as wide a net for new students as possible.
England's single-sex schools began as such because by convention girls born to wealthy 17th and 18th century British families were educated at home by governesses. When girls' education emerged as a wider issue in the late 19th century, the generally accepted view was that it should be done along the same lines as the then existing, separate sex schools. Debate as to whether this arrangement was more or less beneficial than co-education, or that it particularly suited girls, would come later, and it rages today.
Dr Garrick's view that there is no conclusive evidence suggesting girls or boys benefit from a single-sex environment is backed by reliable research and analysis. Many parents, nonetheless, continue to form their own opinions based on what they believe and "know" from their own experiences. One is that girls from single-sex schools will take maths and sciences more frequently than their co-ed counterparts, and do them well – their scholastic endeavours unimpeded by the distractions or put-downs of boys. Another is that single-sex students lag behind their co-ed cousins in personal and social development.
What works (or perhaps works less effectively) depends largely on an evaluation of circumstances, beliefs, character and ambition. It's for education providers to work out which they think is the most appropriate pedagogical environment, and for parents to choose the schools they think best suit their children's needs.
There's nothing to prevent angry parents withdrawing their sons and making other arrangements since there are other excellent boys-only schools in the Territory. But like the clubs which once catered exclusively to men and which were forced to bow to changing social norms by admitting women, schools marching to the beat of the single-sex drum will dwindle in coming years.
