Leadership Likes: Dr Purvis

Let’s Remember Why & How Girls Thrive in Girls-Only Schools

Like many other teachers around the country, I took the opportunity offered by the half-term break to read more than I usually do. One of the things I picked up was an updated version of ‘Why (and How) Girls Thrive in Girls-Only Schools’ by Dr Kevin Stannard: the Girls’ Day School Trust’s Director of Education. There are many benefits to being part of the Girls’ Day School Trust (GDST). From a pupil’s point of view, these include competitions, conferences, trips, career support and guidance, and access to the most extensive network of professional women in the UK, to name but a few. From the perspective of a staff member, the GDST offers unparalleled training opportunities and regular meetings with colleagues doing similar jobs in other GDST schools, not to mention access to the bargaining power and influence which comes with being part of an educational collective. Being part of the GDST also provides close access to cutting-edge research from its in-house team which is headed by Dr Stannard, and which also recently produced the much-lauded Girls’ Futures Report.

I will resist the temptation to retell all the various benefits of single-sex education here, not least because I do not have enough page space to do so. However, I want to remind all of us of the main advantages of the girls-only education that Croydon High School offers. Dr Stannard’s research—which has recently been updated before re-publication—reminds us of things which seem obvious to us because we see them every day, but which are worth remembering, celebrating, and holding dear.

The publication outlines the strong evidence that girls-only education leads to higher academic achievement, greater diversity of subject choice, stronger self-confidence and resilience, and enhanced career progression. Girls differ from boys not on any intellectual or cognitive dimension but in attributes and dispositions that have the most significant impact in their school years, which means that their learning needs and preferences—and indeed their experiences of school—tend to differ from those of boys. For example, my observations in our classrooms are borne out by Dr Stannard’s research. Croydon High pupils prefer cooperative, discursive learning environments; they adapt better to coursework tasks and collaborative, project-based activities and respond to all forms of curriculum content. It is right to pause here, for a moment, to acknowledge that while we do not indulge gender stereotypes which seek to impose any limits on our pupils, the fact remains that girls do tend to respond differently in educational settings to boys.

Dr Stannard convinces us that girls often also adapt their behaviour in the presence of boys, to their disadvantage, for instance, in adopting supporting or moderating roles in discussion, being reticent about risk-taking in inquiry, and their choice of subjects for study. Gender stereotyping and differences in expectations and self-image tend to affect girls’ behaviour, attitudes, and choices, unless they are checked and challenged at school. Girls should have the opportunity to be educated separately, therefore, not because they need protection, but because they deserve a level playing field. However, for single-sex education to be successful, Dr Stannard reminds us that it must be more than an organisational device. It needs to be underpinned by principles and articulated in a set of practices whereby girls are nurtured, challenged, and empowered. Croydon High School is designed for and dedicated to girls’ learning needs and preferences and is free of gender stereotyping and distraction.

In our girls-only environment, girls’ needs and preferences come to the fore. Our teachers can focus on working with, but also challenging, girls’ propensities to seek security in structures and schedules. Research demonstrates, rather powerfully, that in co-educational settings, girls often adopt roles that reflect others’ views of them, and which tend to narrow their choices, both academic and non-academic. In co-educational contexts, girls are more likely than boys to participate but less likely to assume leadership roles in co-curricular groups and other activities. Croydon High School pupils, though, show scant reticence in adopting leadership roles as prefects, big sisters, leaders of co-curricular clubs, group leaders, advocates, and so much more! In everything they do, Croydon High girls are given the space they need to feel empowered to reject gender stereotyping in sports and in subject and career choices.

Dr Stannard’s research traces the historical evolution of girls’ secondary schools and colleges which were established initially to equalise educational opportunities at a time when secondary and higher education were designed for and dominated by men. In a more equal world, it is a truism that we still need single-sex schools because, while society and co-educational schools are more gender-blind, Dr Stannard makes a robust case for the fact that they are still far from gender-equal. Any of the parents or pupils in the recent Sixth Form Open Evening presentation by Dr Lakha-Kassim—our inspirational Head of Progression and Futures and a former medic, lawyer, and businessperson—will remember that women are still woefully underrepresented in business boardrooms across the world.

Against this backdrop, Croydon High School serves a subversive purpose. We seek to challenge traditional gender stereotypes, giving our pupils space to develop a strong sense of themselves and their value and nurture the confidence to make their own choices, free of any sense that the gendered or any other ‘script’ has been written for them. In doing so, Croydon High School provides a supportive environment to complement the rest of a girl’s life, which—crucially—does not exclude boys. Indeed, from their time in our Junior School onwards, our pupils can meet boys socially, compete against them, and work alongside them, as we saw before half term in the Whitgift-Croydon netball match and as we will soon see in our annual Sixth Form fashion show.

I urge every one of you to take some time to read Dr Stannard’s excellent publication. It reminds us of why our single-sex setting allows ‘every girl, every day’ to be liberated so they can make the most of their significant potential.

Dr Philip Purvis

Deputy Head (Academic)