During the last years, the concern about the poor school results of children has been increasing. It is a subject that has happened many times under the radar of the big media, but it is increasingly clear that school failure threatens to become endemic to the male population. Who would imagine that some of the keys to solving it could be in changing the distribution of classes?
That is what a group of researchers have just proposed in a study of more than 200,000 quiceañeros distributed by 8,000 mixed schools around the world. His conclusions are provocative: boys get better results in schools where more than 60% of students are girls.
Against preconceived ideas
It is still curious that very few studies have studied how class characteristics influence inequalities that exist in the school performance of men and women. I say it is curious because we have known for a long time that the school environment is a fundamental element in the (global) development of boys and girls. In fact, there are very solid data that indicate that this is the social environment that most influences children (well above the family environment).
Therefore, the result surprises us and, at the same time, it seems quite reasonable. There is some accumulated evidence that suggested that, although neither girls nor boys directly affect each other, a high number of girls could change the dynamics of the school as a whole, benefiting everyone. And that is what we have confirmed, the higher the number of girls, the results are better. The results of all.
The authors suggest that it is possible for more schools feminized have higher levels of concentration and motivation to get good grades. They also suggest that these results can be used to improve class structure. However, it seems hasty. Neither these nor many other hypotheses manage to explain in depth this positive influence: if we examine the data in detail we see that no explanation fits (at all) with what we see.
There is much to study and many data to collect: especially if we want to understand the mechanism in depth. But what seems clear is that we are facing a very strong argument against segregated schools. One more, at least, to keep in mind.
