Few topics in education raise more passions than sex. Single sex schools, that is. Today'sreport from London University's Institute of Education concluding that women who went to all-girls' schools were more likely to do maths and science A-levels and went on to earn higher salaries will be seized on by supporters of single sex schooling.
Opponents will retort with the recent study of international evidence by Professor Alan Smithers of Buckingham University which found no advantages for girls.
"The reason people think single-sex schools are better is because they do well in league tables," Prof Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research, told the Observer. "But they are generally independent, grammar or former grammar schools and they do well because of the ability and social background of the pupils."
Girls schools alumnae seem to divide into the grateful, who believe that they emerged feeling there was no profession they could not do, and those who say "no daughter of mine will go to one of those places".
Support for single sex schooling has now been swelled by some Muslim parents, although most seem to want their children to integrate in local schools, whatever they happen to be.
Frustratingly for anyone trying to plan the education system, there is more parental support for girls' schools than boys' schools - they want the civilising influence of girls for their sons - which is a circle that cannot be squared.
The trouble is that, as with so many debates in education, no controlled experiments are possible and schools operate in a welter of other influences, including he powerful stereotypes imposed by society and purveyed by the media.
Co-ed schools need to be aware of these pressures, warns Dr Alice Sullivan, author of the IoE study. That sounds good advice whether or not she is right that "single-sex schools seemed more likely to encourage students to pursue academic paths according to their talents rather than their gender, whereas more gender-stereotyped choices were made in co-educational schools."
