Mixed-sex education#Colleges

In early civilizations, people were typically educated informally: primarily within the household. As time progressed, education became more structured and formal. Women often had very few rights when education started to become a more important aspect of civilization. Efforts of the ancient Greek and Chinese societies focused primarily on the education of males. In ancient Rome, the availability of education was gradually extended to women, but they were taught separately from men. The early Christians and medieval Europeans continued this trend, and single-sex schools for the privileged classes prevailed through the Reformation period. The early periods of this century included many religious schools and the first major public schools in the country had been established for males and females.

In the 16th century, at the Council of Trent, the Roman Catholic church reinforced the establishment of free elementary schools for children of all classes. The concept of universal elementary education, regardless of sex, had been created."Coeducation." (n.d.): Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia. Web. 23 October 2012. After the Reformation, coeducation was introduced in Western Europe, when certain Protestant groups urged that boys and girls should be taught to read the Bible. The practice became very popular in northern England, Scotland, and colonial New England, where young children, both male and female, attended dame schools. In the late 18th century, girls gradually were admitted to town schools. The Society of Friends in England, as well as in the United States, pioneered coeducation as they did universal education, and in Quaker settlements in the British colonies, boys and girls commonly attended school together. The new free public elementary, or common schools, which after the American Revolution supplanted church institutions, were almost always coeducational, and by 1900 most public high schools were coeducational as well."coeducation". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica Online. Encyclopædia Britannica Inc., 2012. Web. 23 October 2012. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, coeducation grew much more widely accepted. In Great Britain, Germany, and the Soviet Union, the education of girls and boys in the same classes became an approved practice.

In Australia, there is a trend towards increased coeducational schooling with new coeducational schools opening, few new single-sex schools opening and existing single-sex schools combining or opening their doors to the opposite gender.{{cite web|last1=Guest|first1=Murray|title=The Single Sex v Coeducation Debate and the Experience of Schools that Change Status|url=http://www.as.edu.au/content/uploads/2015/02/Final-Coeducation_Research_Paper_Feb_2015.pdf|publisher=The Armidale School|access-date=2 January 2017|location=Armidale, NSW|date=2014}}

The first mixed-sex institution of higher learning in China was the Nanjing Higher Normal Institute, which was renamed National Central University and Nanjing University. For millennia in China, public schools, especially public higher learning schools, were for men. Generally, only schools established by zōng zú (宗族, gens) were for both male and female students. Some schools, such as Li Zhi's school during the Ming dynasty and Yuan Mei's school during the Qing Dynasty, enrolled both male and female students. In the 1910s, women's universities were established, such as Ginling Women's University and Peking Girls' Higher Normal School, but there was no coeducation in higher learning schools.

Tao Xingzhi, the Chinese advocator of mixed-sex education, proposed The Audit Law for Women Students (規定女子旁聽法案, Guī Dìng Nǚ Zi Páng Tīng Fǎ Àn) at the meeting of Nanjing Higher Normal School held on December seventh, 1919. He also proposed that the university recruit female students. The idea was supported by the president Kuo Ping-Wen, academic director Liu Boming, and such famous professors as Lu Zhiwei and Yang Xingfo, but opposed by many famous men of the time. The meeting passed the law and decided to recruit women students next year. Nanjing Higher Normal School enrolled eight Chinese female students in 1920. In the same year Peking University also began to allow women students to audit classes. One of the most notable female students of that time was Chien-Shiung Wu.

In 1949, the People's Republic of China was founded. The Chinese government pursued a policy of moving towards co-education and nearly all schools and universities have become mixed-sex.{{cite web |title=Single-sex Schools in China |url=https://www.hcrlaw.com/blog/single-sex-schools-in-china/ |website=Harrison, Clark, Rickerby's Solicitors |date=28 January 2019 |access-date=3 December 2019}} In recent years, some female or single-sex schools have again emerged for special vocational training needs, but equal rights for education still applies to all citizens.

Indigenous Muslim populations in China, the Hui and Salars, find coeducation to be controversial, owing to Islamic ideas on gender roles. On the other hand, the Muslim Uyghurs have not historically objected to coeducation.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qRSOAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA202 |title=China's universities, 1895–1995: a century of cultural conflict|author=Ruth Hayhoe|year=1996|publisher=Taylor & Francis|page=202|isbn=0-8153-1859-6|access-date= 29 June 2010}}

Admission to the Sorbonne was opened to girls in 1860.{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vUql-4-eW6QC&pg=PA35|title=La mixité dans l'éducation: Enjeux passés et présents|first1=Rebecca|last1=Rogers (Dir.)|first2=Marlaine|last2=Cacouault|date=30 January 2019|publisher=ENS Editions|via=Google Books|isbn=9782847880618}} The baccalauréat became gender-blind in 1924, giving equal chances to all girls in applying to any universities. Mixed-sex education became mandatory for primary schools in 1957 and for all universities in 1975.{{cite web|url=http://ettajdid.org/spip.php?article138 |title=Réflexions sur la mixité scolaire en France |publisher=Ettajdid.org |access-date=2013-09-16|language=fr}}

{{Expand section|date=June 2008}}

St. Paul's Co-educational College was the first mixed-sex secondary school in Hong Kong. It was founded in 1915 as St. Paul's Girls' College. At the end of World War II, it was temporarily merged with St. Paul's College, which is a boys' school. When classes at the campus of St. Paul's College were resumed, it continued to be mixed and changed to its present name. Some other renowned mixed-sex secondary schools in town include Hong Kong Pui Ching Middle School, Queen Elizabeth School, and Tsuen Wan Government Secondary School. Most Hong Kong primary and secondary schools are mixed-sex, including government public schools, charter schools, and private schools.

Mongolia's first co-educational school, named Third School, opened in Ulaanbaatar on November 2, 1921.{{cite web|url=https://ikon.mn/n/2dde|title=Хүйсээр үл ялгаварлан боловсрол олгож эхэлсэн Ази тивийн анхны сургуулийн 100 жилийн ой|date=2 November 2021|publisher=Ikon}} Subsequent schools have been co-educational and there are no longer any single-sex schools in Mongolia.

{{Further|Education in Pakistan|List of colleges in Pakistan|List of universities in Pakistan}}

Pakistan is one of the many Muslim countries where most schools and colleges are single-gender although some schools and colleges, and most universities are coeducational. In schools that offer O levels and A levels, co-education is quite prevalent. After the independence of Pakistan in 1947, most universities were coeducational but the proportion of women was less than 5%. After the Islamization policies in the early 1980s, the government established Women's colleges and Women's universities to promote education among women who were hesitant to study in a mixed-sex environment. Today, however, most universities and a large number of schools in urban areas are co-educational.

{{Further|Education in the United Kingdom}}

In the United Kingdom the official term is mixed,{{UK SI | year=2007 | number=2324 | url=http://www.statutelaw.gov.uk/content.aspx?LegType=All+Legislation&searchDay=15&searchMonth=9&searchYear=2007&searchEnacted=0&text=mixed+sex&extent=E%2bW%2bS%2bN.I.&extentMatchOnly=0&confersPower=0&blanketAmendment=0&sortAlpha=0&PageNumber=1&NavFrom=0&parentActiveTextDocId=3399271&ActiveTextDocId=3399271&filesize=51744 | title=The Education (School Performance Information) (England) Regulations 2007}}, Schedule 6, regulation 11, clause 5(b). and today most schools are mixed. A number of Quaker co-educational boarding schools were established before the 19th century.

The world's oldest co-educational school is thought to be Archbishop Tenison's Church of England High School, Croydon, established in 1714 in the United Kingdom, which admitted 10 boys and 10 girls from its opening, and remained co-educational thereafter. This is a day school only and still in existence.

The Scottish Dollar Academy was the first mixed-sex both day and boarding school in the UK. Founded in 1818, it is the oldest both boarding and day mixed-sex educational institution in the world still in existence. In England, the first non-Quaker mixed-sex public boarding school was Bedales School, founded in 1893 by John Haden Badley and becoming mixed in 1898. The first non-denominational co-educational day school in England was The King Alfred School, in North West London, which was officially opened by Millicent Garrett Fawcett on 24 June 1898. Ruckleigh School in Solihull was founded by Cathleen Cartland in 1909 as a non-denominational co-educational preparatory school many decades before others followed. Many previously single-sex schools have begun to accept both sexes in the past few decades: for example, Clifton College began to accept girls in 1987.Christine Skelton, ed. Whatever happens to little women?: gender and primary schooling (London:. Open University Press, 1989)

{{Further |University of Oxford#Women's education| University of Cambridge#Women's education|History of Durham University#Women students}}

In 1869, the Edinburgh Seven became the first women to be admitted as undergraduates to a British university. However, they were not allowed to attend the same lectures as men and were eventually barred from receiving degrees.{{cite web|url=https://blogs.ed.ac.uk/edmedtimeline/what-was-life-like-at-the-university-as-the-first-female-students/|title=What was life like at the University as the first female students?|website=Edinburgh Medicine Timeline|publisher=University of Edinburgh|author= Alexandra Nash|access-date=30 January 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://www.nhslanarkshire.scot.nhs.uk/pulse-womens-history-month-the-edinburgh-seven/|title=Women's History Month: The Edinburgh Seven|date=25 March 2024|work=The Pulse|publisher=NHS Lanarkshire|access-date=30 January 2025}}

The first higher-education institution in the United Kingdom to enrol women and men on equal terms was the University of Bristol (then University College, Bristol) in 1876.{{cite web |url=http://www.bristol.ac.uk/university/history/ |title=History of the University – About the University – University of Bristol |publisher=University of Bristol |website=www.bristol.ac.uk}} The University of London was the first British university to admit women to degrees alongside men, in 1878, but was an examining board rather than a teaching institution at that time.{{cite web|url=https://www.london.ac.uk/about/history|title=History of the University of London|website=University of London|access-date=30 January 2025}} The federal Victoria University was established in 1880 and was authorised to grant degrees to men and women, and from 1883 Owens College (then the only college of the university; now the University of Manchester) admitted women.{{cite web|url=https://www.library.manchester.ac.uk/rylands/special-collections/a-to-z/detail/?mms_id=992983876706101631|title=University of Manchester Archives|website=University of Manchester Library|access-date=30 January 2025}} Durham University College of Science (now Newcastle University) had allowed women to study alongside men from its foundation in 1871, but the first women did not enrol until 1880. Women at Durham could take the Associate in Science at this time, but were not permitted to take full degrees until 1895 and could not become members of convocation until 1913.{{cite journal|journal=Durham University Journal|date=13 November 1880|title=The College of Physical Science|page=53|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=JgAIAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA53|volume=4|issue=16}}{{cite journal|journal=Durham University Journal|title=The Jubilee of Armstrong College|page=352|author=P. Phillips Bedson|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GUxIAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA352|date=December 1921|volume=22}}{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150729085244/http://www.stmaryscollegesociety.co.uk/history/|url=http://www.stmaryscollegesociety.co.uk/history/|title=History of the College|website=St Mary's College Society|archive-date=29 July 2015}} The Scottish universities were opened to women by the Universities (Scotland) Act 1889, with the first women being admitted in 1892, although women remained barred from studying medicine until 1916.{{cite web|url=https://www.nls.uk/learning-zone/science-and-technology/women-scientists/|title=Scottish women of science|website=National Library of Scotland|access-date=30 January 2025}} At Oxford, women were admitted to membership of the university and to degrees from 1920,{{cite web|url=https://www.ox.ac.uk/about/organisation/history|at=1920|title=History|website=University of Oxford|access-date=30 January 2025}}{{cite web|url=https://www.ox.ac.uk/about/oxford-people/women-at-oxford/centenary-womens-timeline|title=Timeline: 100 years of women's history at Oxford|website=University of Oxford|access-date=30 January 2025}} while at Cambridge this did not occur until 1948.{{cite web|url=https://newn.cam.ac.uk/newnham-news/75th-anniversary-celebrations-of-degrees-for-women-at-cambridge|title=75th anniversary celebration of degrees for women at Cambridge|website=Newnham College|date=13 February 2024 |access-date=30 January 2025}} Women at Cambridge continued to have to take examinations in different rooms from the men until 1956.{{cite web|url=https://wonkhe.com/blogs/higher-education-postcard-girton-college-cambridge/|title=Higher education postcard: Girton College, Cambridge|author=Hugh Jones|work=Wonkhe|date=1 March 2024}}

Accommodation at universities became mixed much later than education, starting in the 1960s with the plate glass universities. At Sussex (1961), the halls of residence were single sex, while the halls at Essex (1965) were mixed but with floors segregated by sex. At the first Lancaster colleges, Bowland and Lonsdale (1964), floors were mixed but segregated by area, while in Lancaster's third college, Cartmel (1968), segregation was only by corridor.{{cite journal|journal=Arquitetura Revista|volume= 16|issue= 1|page=97-118|year=2020|author=Débora Domingo-Calabuig |author2= Laura Lizondo-Sevilla|title=STUDENT HOUSING AT PLATEGLASS UNIVERSITIES: A COMPARATIVE STUDY}}{{cite magazine|url=https://issuu.com/lumsalumni/docs/14._50th_anniversary_spread_e4be058b679e6a|page=5|magazine=SCAN: Lancaster University's 50th Anniversary Edition|title=A brief history of the University of Lancaster|author1=Daniel Snape|author2=Matthew Gillings|date=26 June 2014}}

Given their dual role as both residential and educational establishments, and that most undergraduate students were not legally adults until the 1970s, individual colleges at Oxford, Cambridge and Durham remained segregated for longer than their parent universities. The first to become mixed were post-graduate colleges and societies, whose students were legally adults, starting with Oxford's Nuffield College from its establishment in 1937.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/education/2008/jun/03/postgraduate.highereducation|title= Revolutionary road|author=Malcolm Dean|date=3 June 2008|work=The Guardian}} The first mixed Cambridge college was the post-graduate Darwin from its foundation in 1964;{{cite web|url=https://www.darwin.cam.ac.uk/60th/|title=Darwin College - 60th Anniversary|website=Darwin College, Cambridge|date=10 January 2024 |access-date=4 February 2025}} similarly, Durham's Graduate Society (now Ustinov College) was mixed from its opening in 1965.{{cite book|chapter-url=https://reed.dur.ac.uk/xtf/view?docId=bookreader%2FDU_Warden%2Fwarden65%2Fwr1965METSfile.xml&hit.rank=1#page/121/mode/1up|page=115|chapter=Graduate Society|title= Report by the Vice-chancellor and Warden for the year 1965-66|year=1966|publisher=Durham University}} Until 1970, students under 21 were not legally adults and universities and colleges acted in loco parentis.{{cite web|url=https://www.hepi.ac.uk/2018/04/25/universities-loco-parentis-good-old-days-bad-old-days/|title=Are universities in loco parentis? The good old days or the bad old days?|date=25 April 2018|author= Nick Hillman |website=HEPI}} After the age of majority was reduced to 18 in 1970, restrictions on mixed student residences began to be lifted.{{cite web|url=https://wonkhe.com/blogs/much-freedom-good-looking-back-loco-parentis/|website=Wonkhe|title="As much freedom as is good for them" – looking back at in loco parentis|author=David Malcolm|date=7 March 2018}} In 1972, Churchill, Clare, and King's colleges became the first previously all-male Cambridge colleges to admit female undergraduates,{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/obituaries/story/0,3604,976477,00.html |title=Obituary – Professor Sir Bernard Williams |date=13 June 2003 |work=The Guardian |access-date=8 May 2009}} while the first mixed undergraduate colleges at Durham, also in 1972, were Collingwood College, which was founded that year and was also the first British university residence to have mixed-sex corridors,{{cite web|url=https://www.durham.ac.uk/media/durham-university/colleges/collingwood-college-/50-Years-of-Collingwood.pdf|title=50 Years of Collingwood|website=Durham University|access-date=30 January 2025}} and the originally all-male Van Mildert College.{{cite book|url=https://issuu.com/communicationsoffice/docs/van_mildert_college_60th_anniversary_brochure|title=Van Mildert College 60th Anniversary Brochure|publisher=Durham University|via=Issuu|date=4 February 2025|page=7}} The first five undergraduate colleges at Oxford (Brasenose, Hertford, Jesus, St Catherine's, and Wadham) became mixed in 1974.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1972/04/29/archives/5-oxford-mens-colleges-to-admit-women-in-1974.html|title=5 Oxford Men's Colleges To Admit Women in 1974|date=29 April 1972| work=The New York Times}} The last all-male colleges became mixed in 1988, including Magdalene College, Cambridge,{{cite news|url=https://www.varsity.co.uk/features/26010|title=Women at Magdalene: A chequered history|work=Varsity|author=Claire Gao|date=6 September 2023}} Hatfield College, Durham{{cite web|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191023205543/https://www.dur.ac.uk/hatfield.college/alumni/events/thirty/|archive-date=23 October 2019|url=https://www.dur.ac.uk/hatfield.college/alumni/events/thirty/|title=Celebrating 30 Years of Hatfield Women|access-date=30 January 2025}} and St Chad's College, Durham;{{cite web|url=https://www.stchads.ac.uk/college/news/celebrating-chads-women-at-the-ladies-and-friends-formal/|title=Celebrating Chad's Women at the Ladies' and Friends' Formal|date=27 February 2019|website=St Chad's College|access-date=30 January 2025}}{{cite magazine|url=https://issuu.com/stchadscollege/docs/chadsian_2018|magazine=The Chadsian|date=2018|page=27|title=Chadswomen}} the last all-male colleges at Oxford having become mixed in 1986.{{cite news|url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorrison/2018/01/25/women-outnumber-men-at-oxford-for-first-time-in-800-years/|title=Women Outnumber Men At Oxford For First Time In 800 Years|author=Nick Morrison|work=Forbes|date=25 January 2018}} St Benet's Hall (now closed), a permanent private hall rather than a college, was the last institution at Oxford to become mixed, admitting postgraduate women from 2014 and undergraduates from 2016.{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10497607/Oxford-hall-announces-decision-to-admit-women.html|title=Oxford hall announces decision to admit women|work=The Telegraph|date=5 December 2013|author=Josie Gurney Read}}{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/education-33014473|title=Last all-male Oxford institution votes to admit women|date=4 June 2015|work=BBC News}}

The last women's college in Durham, St Mary's, became mixed in 2005.{{cite book|url=https://www.durham.ac.uk/media/durham-university/colleges/st-maryx27s-college/7628_DU_St_Marys_Anniversary_Booklet_Accessbile_NEW.pdf|title=Celebrating 125 Years|publisher=St Mary's College, Durham|page=7|access-date=30 January 2025|year=2024}} At Oxford, the last women's college, St Hilda's, became mixed in 2008. {{as of|2025|post=,}} two colleges remain single-sex (women-only) at Cambridge: Murray Edwards (New Hall) and Newnham. Single-sex women's accommodation continues the be available at some other universities, including Aberdare Hall at Cardiff,{{cite web|url=https://www.cardiff.ac.uk/study/accommodation/residences/aberdare-hall|title=Aberdare Hall|website=Cardiff University|access-date=6 February 2025}} and the Boughton Wing of St Mary's College, Durham.{{cite web|url=https://www.durham.ac.uk/colleges-and-student-experience/colleges/st-marys/accommodation-and-catering/|title=Accommodation|website=St Mary's College, Durham|access-date=6 February 2025}}

{{Further|List of earliest coeducational colleges and universities in the United States|Women's colleges in the United States}}

File:Oberlin College - Bosworth Hall.jpg, the oldest extant mixed-sex institute of higher education in the United States]]

The oldest extant mixed-sex institute of higher education in the United States is Oberlin College in Oberlin, Ohio, which was established in 1833. Mixed-sex classes were admitted to the preparatory department at Oberlin in 1833 and the college department in 1837.{{cite web | title = One Hundred Years Toward Suffrage | url = http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/naw/nawstime.html | access-date = 26 January 2010}}{{cite web | last = Jones | first = Christine | title = Indiana University: The Transition to Coeduation | url = http://www.indiana.edu/~iuspa/journal/editions/2002/Jones.pdf | access-date = 11 January 2010}} The first four women to receive bachelor's degrees in the United States earned them at Oberlin in 1841. Later, in 1862, the first black woman to receive a bachelor's degree (Mary Jane Patterson) also earned it from Oberlin College. Beginning in 1844, Hillsdale College became the next college to admit mixed-sex classes to four-year degree programs.{{cite web | title = Hillsdale College – History & Misson | url = http://www.hillsdale.edu/about/history.asp | access-date = 15 January 2010}}

The University of Iowa became the first coeducational public or state university in the United States in 1855,{{cite web | first = A.J. | last = May | title = University of Rochester History | url = http://www.lib.rochester.edu/index.cfm?PAGE=2319 }}{{cite web |title=University of Iowa Firsts |url=http://www.uiowa.edu/facts/UI-firsts/index.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060515022742/http://www.uiowa.edu/facts/UI-firsts/index.htm |archive-date=May 15, 2006}} and for much of the next century, public universities, and land grant universities in particular, would lead the way in mixed-sex higher education. There were also many private coeducational universities founded in the 19th century, especially west of the Mississippi River. East of the Mississippi, Wheaton College (Illinois) graduated its first female student in 1862.{{Cite web|url=http://a2z.my.wheaton.edu/wheaton-firsts|title=Wheaton "Firsts" – Wheaton History A to Z|website=a2z.my.wheaton.edu|access-date=2017-05-24}} Bates College in Maine was open to women from its founding in 1855, and graduated its first female student in 1869.{{cite web |title=Mary W. Mitchell Class of 1869 – First Female Graduate |url=https://www.bates.edu/150-years/bates-greats/mary-w-mitchell/ |website=Bates College |date=22 March 2010 |access-date=6 April 2020}} Cornell University{{cite web|url=http://www.gradschool.cornell.edu/index.php?p=36|title=Our History|access-date= 21 February 2010}} and the University of Michigan{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books/about/Women_at_Michigan.htm|title=Dangerous Experiment}} each admitted their first female students in 1870.

Around the same time, single-sex women's colleges were also appearing. According to Irene Harwarth, Mindi Maline, and Elizabeth DeBra: "women's colleges were founded during the mid- and late-19th century in response to a need for advanced education for women at a time when they were not admitted to most institutions of higher education."{{cite web|url=http://www.ed.gov/offices/OERI/PLLI/webreprt.html|title=Women's Colleges in the United States: History, Issues, and Challenges|access-date=14 October 2006 |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060428110902/http://www.ed.gov/offices/OERI/PLLI/webreprt.html |archive-date=28 April 2006 }} Notable examples include the Seven Sisters colleges, of which Vassar College is now coeducational and Radcliffe College has merged with Harvard University. Other notable women's colleges that have become coeducational include Wheaton College in Massachusetts, Ohio Wesleyan Female College in Ohio, Skidmore College, Wells College, and Sarah Lawrence College in New York state, Pitzer College in California, Goucher College in Maryland and Connecticut College.

By 1900 the Briton Frederic Harrison said after visiting the United States that "The whole educational machinery of America ... open to women must be at least twentyfold greater than with us, and it is rapidly advancing to meet that of men both in numbers and quality".{{cite book | url=https://archive.org/stream/americanizationo01stea#page/384/mode/2up | title=The Americanization of the World | publisher=Horace Markley | author=Stead, W. T. | year=1901 | pages=385–386}} Where most of the history of coeducation in this period is a list of those moving toward the accommodation of both men and women at one campus, the state of Florida was an exception. In 1905, the Buckman Act was one of consolidation in governance and funding but separation in race and gender, with Florida State College for Women (since 1947, Florida State University) established to serve white females during this era, the campus that became what is now the University of Florida serving white males, and coeducation stipulated only for the campus serving black students at the site of what is now Florida A&M University. Florida did not return to coeducation at UF and FSU until after World War II, prompted by the drastically increased demands placed on the higher education system by veterans studying via GI Bill programs following World War II. The Buckman arrangements officially ended with new legislation guidelines passed in 1947.

Several early primary and secondary schools in the United States were single-sex. Examples include Collegiate School, a boys' school operating in New York by 1638 (which remains a single-sex institution); and Boston Latin School, founded in 1635 (which did not become coeducational until 1972).

Nonetheless, mixed-sex education existed at the lower levels in the U.S. long before it extended to colleges. For example, in 1787, the predecessor to Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, opened as a mixed-sex secondary school.{{cite web|title=Milestones Achieved by the Women of F&M |url=http://www.fandm.edu/x22560 |access-date=27 January 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091106111903/http://www.fandm.edu/x22560 |archive-date=6 November 2009 }}{{cite web|title=F&M: 40 Years of Coeducation |url=http://www.fandm.edu/40yearsofcoed |access-date=27 January 2010 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091105040810/http://www.fandm.edu/40yearsofcoed |archive-date=5 November 2009 }} Its first enrollment class consisted of 78 male and 36 female students. Among the latter was Rebecca Gratz who would become an educator and philanthropist. However, the school soon began having financial problems and it reopened as an all-male institution. Westford Academy in Westford, Massachusetts has operated as mixed-sex secondary school since its founding in 1792, making it the oldest continuously operating coed school in America.{{cite news|url=http://www.wickedlocal.com/westford/archive/x2136193253 |title=History of Westford Academy |last=Simmons |first=Carrie |date=7 September 2007 |work=Westford Eagle |access-date=24 May 2009 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110520013124/http://www.wickedlocal.com/westford/archive/x2136193253 |archive-date=20 May 2011 }} The oldest continuously operating coed boarding school in the United States is Westtown School, founded in 1799.{{cite web | url=https://www.westtown.edu/our-purpose/history | title=History – Westtown School }}

{{See also|Oberlin College#History}}

A minister and a missionary founded Oberlin in 1833. Rev. John Jay Shipherd (minister) and Philo P. Stewart (missionary) became friends while spending the summer of 1832 together in nearby Elyria. They discovered a mutual disenchantment with what they saw as the lack of strong Christian principles among the settlers of the American West. They decided to establish a college and a colony based on their religious beliefs, "where they would train teachers and other Christian leaders for the boundless most desolate fields in the West".

Oberlin College and the surrounding community were dedicated to progressive causes and social justice. Though it did reluctantly what every other college refused to do at all, it was the first college to admit both women and African Americans as students. Women were not admitted to the baccalaureate program, which granted bachelor's degrees, until 1837; prior to that, they received diplomas from what was called the Ladies' Course. The initial 1837 students were Caroline Mary Rudd, Elizabeth Prall, Mary Hosford, and Mary Fletcher Kellogg.{{Cite journal|url=https://www.academia.edu/4860900|title=Single-Sex Education VS Co-Education|website=www.academia.edu|access-date=2016-05-17|last1=Boukranaa|first1=Ahmed}}

The early success and achievement of women at Oberlin College persuaded many early women's rights leaders that coeducation would soon be accepted throughout the country. However, for quite a while, women sometimes were treated rudely by their male classmates. The prejudice of some male professors proved more unsettling. Many professors disapproved of the admission of women into their classes, citing studies that claimed that women were mentally unsuited for higher education, and because most would "just get married", they were using resources that, they believed, male students would use better. Some professors simply ignored the women students.

By the end of the 19th century 70% of American colleges were coeducational,{{fact|date=January 2024}} although the state of Florida was a notable exception; the Buckman Act of 1905 imposed gender-separated white higher education at the University of Florida (men) and Florida State College for Women. (As there was only one state college for blacks, the future Florida A&M University, it admitted both men and women.) The white Florida campuses returned to coeducation in 1947, when the women's college became Florida State University and the University of Florida became coeducational.{{cite journal |last1=Kerber |first1=Stephen |title=William Edwards and the Historic University of Florida Campus: A Photographic Essay |journal=The Florida Historical Quarterly |date=January 1979 |volume=57 |issue=3 |pages=327–336 |jstor=30148527 }} In the late 20th century, many institutions of higher learning that had been exclusively for people of one sex became coeducational.

{{main|List of social fraternities and sororities #Coeducational fraternities}}

A number of Greek-letter student societies have either been established (locally or nationally) or expanded as co-ed fraternities.

In American colloquial language, "coed" or "co-ed" is used to refer to a mixed school.

The word is also often used to describe a situation in which both sexes are integrated in any form (e.g., "The team is coed"). Less common in the 21st century is the noun use of word "coed", which traditionally referred to a female student in a mixed gender school.{{cite web|url=http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/coed |title=Coed – Definition and More from the Free Merriam-Webster Dictionary |publisher=Merriam-webster.com |date=2012-08-31 |access-date=2013-09-16}} The noun use is considered by many to be sexist and unprofessional, the argument being that applying the term solely to women implies that "normal" education is exclusively male:{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/lookinggoodcolle0000lowe |url-access=registration |quote=cornell. |author=Lowe, Margaret A.|title=Looking Good: College Women and Body Image, 1875–1930|page=[https://archive.org/details/lookinggoodcolle0000lowe/page/63 63] |publisher=Johns Hopkins UP |year=2003 |access-date=2013-11-03|isbn=9780801882746}}{{cite web|url=http://writingasjoe.blogspot.com/2006/09/dont-ever-call-my-daughter-coed.html |title=Don't Ever Call My Daughter a Coed|publisher=Writing as Jo(e)|date=2006-09-30 |access-date=2013-11-03}} technically both male and female students at a coeducational institution should be considered "coeds".{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=KY_XiQa5PhMC&q=%22coed+is%22&pg=PA132|author=Miller, Casey, and Kate Smith.|title=The Handbook of Nonsexist Writing |publisher=Lippincott & Crowell |date=2000 |access-date=2017-04-14|isbn=9780595159215}} Writing for the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development in 2017, author and educator Barbara Boroson described the noun use as "unfortunate", observing that "Although coeducation means 'the education of both sexes together at the same time{{sic|hide=y|,'}} women were considered to be the physical manifestations of the coeducation movement. While men were called students, women were called coeds. The message was that women . . . were not really students."{{cite web|url=https://www.ascd.org/el/articles/inclusive-education-lessons-from-history |author=Boroson, Barbara.|title=Inclusive Education: Lessons from History|publisher=Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development |date=April 1, 2017 |access-date=2024-06-28}} Numerous professional organizations require that the gender-neutral term "student" be used instead of "coed" or, when gender is relevant to the context, that the term "female student" be substituted.{{cite web|url=http://www.apaonline.org/?page=nonsexist |title=Guidelines for Non-Sexist Use of Language|publisher=Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association (Vol. 59, Number 3, pp. 471–482) |date=February 1986 |access-date=2013-11-03}}{{cite web|url=http://cab-acr.ca/english/social/codes/guidelines_nonsexist.pdf |title=Guidelines for Non-Sexist Language |publisher=Canadian Association of Broadcasters |access-date=2013-11-03}}{{cite web|url=http://www.ncte.org/positions/statements/genderfairuseoflang |title=Guidelines for Gender-Fair Use of Language |publisher=National Council of Teachers of English |date=June 2008 |access-date=2013-11-03}}{{cite web|url=https://capitalareastem.org/news/editorial-style.html |title=Capital Area STEM Editorial Style Guidelines|publisher=LA Board of Regents|date=October 2023 |access-date=2024-06-29}}

{{Expand section|small=no|date=June 2017}}

{{blockquote|If the sexes were educated together, we should have the healthy, moral and intellectual stimulus of sex ever quickening and refining all the faculties, without the undue excitement of senses that results from novelty in the present system of isolation.|Elizabeth Cady Stanton{{cite web|last=Rosenberg |first=Rosalind |title=The History of Coeducation in America |url=http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/learn/documents/coeducation.htm |access-date=24 October 2012 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121222003458/http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/learn/documents/coeducation.htm |archive-date=22 December 2012}}}}

For years, a question many educators, parents, and researchers have been asking is whether it is academically beneficial to teach boys and girls together or separately at school.{{cite web|last1=Guest|first1=Murray|title=Analysis and Research into Co-education in Australia and the UK|url=http://www.as.edu.au/content/uploads/2015/02/Final-Coeducation_Research_Paper_Feb_2015.pdf|publisher=The Armidale School|access-date=2 January 2017|location=Armidale, NSW|date=2014}} Some argue that coeducation has primarily social benefits by allowing males and females of all ages to become more prepared for real-world situations and that students familiar with a single-sex setting could be less prepared, nervous, or uneasy.

However, some argue that at certain ages, students may be more distracted by the opposite sex in a coeducational setting, but others point to this being based on an assumption that all students are heterosexual. There is evidence that girls may perform less well in traditionally male-dominated subjects such as the sciences when in a class with boys, but other research suggests that when the previous attainment is taken into account, that difference falls away.{{cite web |title=Do our views about co-ed versus single-sex schools hold up? |url=https://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/life-and-relationships/do-our-views-about-co-ed-versus-single-sex-schools-hold-up-20180318-p4z4zq.html |website=The Sydney Morning Herald|date=18 March 2018 |access-date=3 December 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/women-in-leadership/2013/oct/30/co-educational-schools-bad-for-girls|first=Belinda|last=Palmar|title=Co-educational schools are bad for girls|newspaper=The Guardian|date=30 October 2013|access-date=10 June 2017}} According to advocates of coeducation, without classmates of the opposite sex, students have social issues that may impact adolescent development. They argue that the absence of the opposite sex creates an unrealistic environment not duplicated in the real world.{{Cite web|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/why-single-sex-schools-are-bad-for-your-health-if-youre-a-boy-1831636.html |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220515/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/why-single-sex-schools-are-bad-for-your-health-if-youre-a-boy-1831636.html |archive-date=15 May 2022 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|first=Richard|last=Garner|title=Why single-sex schools are bad for your health (if you're a boy)|newspaper=The Independent|date=1 December 2009|access-date=10 June 2017}} Some studies show that in classes that are separated by gender, male and female students work and learn on the same level as their peers, the stereotypical mentality of the teacher is removed, and girls are likely to have more confidence in the classroom than they would in a coeducational class.Mael, F. (1998). Single-sex and coeducational schooling: Relationships to socioemotional and academic development. Review of Educational Research, 68(2), 101–129. American Educational Research Association. In a 2022 study published in the British Educational Research Journal which examined the Irish educational system, the authors stated that the existing "empirical evidence is somewhat ambiguous, with some studies finding a positive impact of single-sex schooling on education achievement [...] but others finding average null effects";{{cite journal |last1=Clavel |first1=Jose G. |last2=Flannery |first2=Darragh |date=15 December 2022 |title=Single-sex schooling, gender and educational performance: Evidence using PISA data |journal=British Educational Research Journal |volume=49 |issue=2 |pages=248–265 |doi=10.1002/berj.3841 |doi-access=free }} they concluded that after controlling for "individual, parental and school-level factors [...] on average, there is no significant difference in performance for girls or boys who attend single-sex schools compared to their mixed-school peers in science, mathematics or reading."

{{Portal|Education}}

{{div col|colwidth=30em}}

• Co-educational boarding schools
• Heterosociality
• List of women's colleges
• Men's colleges
• Mixed-sex sports
• Single-sex education
• Unisex public toilet
• Women's colleges

{{div col end}}

{{Reflist}}

• Fennell, Shailaja, and Madeleine Arnot. Gender Education and Equality in a Global Context: Conceptual frameworks and policy perspectives (Routledge, 2007)
• Goodman, Joyce, James C. Albisetti, and Rebecca Rogers, eds. Girls' Secondary Education in the Western World: From the 18th to the 20th Century (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010)
• Karnaouch, Denise. "Féminisme et coéducation en Europe avant 1914." Clio. Femmes, genre, histoire 18 (2003): 21–41.

• Albisetti, James C. "Un-learned lessons from the New World? English views of American coeducation and women's colleges, c. 1865–1910." History of Education 29.5 (2000): 473–489.
• Jackson, Carolyn, and Ian David Smith. "Poles apart? An exploration of single-sex and mixed-sex educational environments in Australia and England." Educational Studies 26.4 (2000): 409–422.

• Hansot, Elisabeth, and David Tyack. "Gender in American public schools: Thinking institutionally." Signs (1988): 741–760. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/3174110 in JSTOR]
• Lasser, Carol, ed. Educating men and women together: Coeducation in a changing world (1987), colleges
• Tyack, David, and Elizabeth Hansot. Learning together: A history of coeducation in American public schools (Russell Sage Foundation, 1992) on K-12 schools

{{EB1911 Poster|Co-education}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20061023193654/http://beatl.barnard.columbia.edu/learn/documents/coeducation.htm Rosenberg: Coeducation History]
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20181117211659/http://www.coedschools.org/ American Council for CoEducational Schooling]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mixed-Sex Education}}

Category:Educational environment

Category:School types