Single-Sex Education, Part 2

All Girls: Single-Sex Education and Why It Matters
by Karen Stabiner

(Page 2 of 2)

Marlborough School

Los Angeles, California, September, 1998

There was so much bravado: seniors rule chalked on the driveway, red and white crepe paper draped in the trees, a sprinkler shaped like an octopus spraying water at unsuspecting seventh graders. Some members of the Marlborough School class of 1999 painted "99" on their cheeks with the lipstick they never wore to class. Others pulled their hair into pigtails that they rolled and anchored high on their heads with bobby pins. Several girls wore shiny fuchsia tiaras, while others carried plastic tridents. They should have discarded their outgrown uniform skirts years ago, but instead they unbuttoned the tight waistbands and rolled them over, the hems hiked to mid-thigh; no point investing in a new skirt ten months from graduation. Underneath they wore boys' striped boxer shorts.

The parents had set out a breakfast buffet on long tables at either side of the school entrance, but the girls were too excited to eat. They hung on each other like drunks, laughing and shrieking, halfheartedly pledging to stop making so much noise. It was not yet eight o'clock in the morning.

One cluster of seniors stood under a sign that read finally, our last first day of school, fussing over the new "girl" in class-a tall, thin boy wearing a school uniform, his blond pageboy wig held in place by a headband, imitating the way Marlborough head of school Barbara Wagner wore her hair. The boy had bright-red lips and wore falsies, but the stubble on his jawline and the hair on his legs gave him away.

The seniors always sneaked a boy onto campus for the first day of school. It was a tradition, along with decorating the grounds and Ms. Wagner's home, which was on the next block, right behind the campus. After five grueling years, the seniors had earned the right to a raucous return-and for once, the faculty did nothing to stop them.

Leslie Klein, the senior class team leader and yearbook sponsor, darted through the crowd with her big Nikon 90, snapping away. Several teachers shepherded bewildered new students past the entrance, while others stood at the central hallway, ready to help a seventh grader stymied by her schedule. Many of the teachers wore brand-new white T-shirts over their street clothes, with the inscription competence, confidence, connectedness. T-shirts were a violation of the faculty dress code, which required collared blouses or sweaters for the women and dress shirts and ties for the men. But Wagner had made an exception today-in fact, she had handed out the shirts at a faculty meeting and encouraged her staff to wear them on the first day of school. The three C's were her theme for the year, borrowed from How Girls Thrive, an overview of single-sex literature that she had read over the summer. These were the qualities she wanted to instill in each Marlborough girl.

Monica Ward, one of the two college counselors, watched the antics of the class of 1999 silently and wondered how well they would survive the college-application process in the coming months. This year held the promise of success, and the threat of public disappointment and defeat. The three C's were one thing inside these walls; they might be harder to sustain as the outside world intruded and passed judgment. Let the seniors disrupt a single morning. Ms. Ward knew just how little time they had to make fools of themselves.

The seniors got rid of their silliness the way a dog shakes off water, in one great controlled shimmy, and then it was time to get to work.

Once the seventh graders had memorized their locker combinations and met all their teachers, they took a four-day trip to Catalina Island. A luxury bus full of jumpy girls and faculty chaperones pulled away down Rossmore Avenue early in the morning, leaving a handful of parents who were not quite sure what to do next. One mother sniffled, wiped at her eyes, and wandered down the street toward home. Another stood in the school's curved driveway and stared north, though the bus quickly disappeared from view. A relieved father who had screeched up in his mini-van just in time to deliver a forgotten pair of glasses sat in the driver's seat, laughing.

Girls were supposed to learn better if they worked and studied together, so the first assignment of seventh grade was to start making friends. The message was reinforced in each subsequent year: The eighth, ninth, and tenth graders were on their way to retreats in Big Bear, Sequoia National Forest, and the Marin Headlands, and this morning all seventy-seven members of the eleventh grade had met at Los Angeles International Airport for a class trip to Olympia, Washington.

The seniors stayed behind. Having learned to work together, it was time for them to separate, to begin to work solely for themselves. A year from now, the class of 1999 would be scattered at colleges and universities all over the country. To help them with the application process, Marlborough started the year with a three-day workshop on how to create a great college application-followed by a four-day weekend to give them time to visit campuses.

They shuffled into Caswell Hall, affecting nonchalance. The seniors were allowed to wear street clothes this week, but they all looked pretty much the same: The outfit of choice was a tiny cotton knit tank top, preferably in a pastel shade, worn over a bra of a different color, straps visible, and a pair of emphatically tired jeans. Choosing a more imaginative outfit would have been a drain on their energies. Today required absolute focus.

Marlborough students had been taught to expect that they would go to a great school. Many of them felt doubly entitled-money had bought them anything they wanted, and Marlborough had taught them that they were special, better prepared than girls who came from coeducational schools. They might complain about the rigorous schedule, the mountains of homework, and the absence of boys, but most of the girls assumed they would be rewarded for their sacrifice. Their parents, who had paid about $14,000 annually for tuition-and more for books, uniforms, and annual giving-also expected results.

This week was an attempt on the school's part to impose order on the chaotic process of choosing a college. It was far more competitive than it had been when the girls' parents were high school seniors. Mothers and fathers who had applied to two or three schools listened to their daughters discuss a dozen prospects, up from half that just five years earlier. They heard their daughters' friends talk about the same schools and silently worked the odds in their heads.

At the beginning of the year, any dream was up for grabs: a scholarship to Harvard College, recruitment by Stanford University, the dizzy possibility of having to choose between Brown University and the University of Chicago. Marlborough seniors aimed high. Although there were more than 3,000 colleges and universities in the United States, the girls in this room would limit themselves to about 130 schools. The least competitive of those 130 schools might take half their applicants, but the top schools took less than ten percent. Everyone in the room knew the numbers, but no one, on this first day of the future, believed that she would be one of those turned away.

Or rather, no one admitted it. Anxiety was the first item on the day's agenda, and a trio of staff members was ready to address it. Dr. Susan Lewandowski, in her second year as director of college counseling, was the first to speak. A short, neat woman whose frank manner was sometimes mistaken for pessimism, Dr. Lewandowski tried to be reassuring without ever losing sight of reality. As an associate director of admissions at Smith College for nine years before coming to Marlborough, she knew firsthand just how difficult that could be.

"I want you to know you have a team here," she said, to a sea of blank faces. "We've heard your anxiety about the college essay, about how to put yourself on paper; a lot of anxiety in general. It's a stressful year. There will be major periods of deadline distress." She reviewed a list of important dates-the deadline to register for the October Scholastic Achievement Tests, the deadline to get teacher recommendations, the schedule for parent-and-student conferences with the two college counselors. Girls who were set on a single college were already at work on their early decision applications, and would hear back in mid-December. The rest of the girls had to turn in their applications between November and January and would receive word in the spring.

Dr. Lewandowski and Barbara Wagner were concerned about the growing number of seniors who had decided to apply early, and the accompanying pressure on the other girls to make a choice before they were ready. There were two kinds of early applications-early decision, which was binding, and early action, which allowed a student to consider other schools-but the distinction was lost on most of the girls, who only cared about not having to wait until the spring. Wagner preached patience to all but the most determined students; early applications deprived the rest of what she called "important maturational time.v They made up their minds too fast in the name of security, when sometimes the best decision came with time.

An early rejection could be particularly devastating. One application, one rejection; there was nothing to buffer the disappointment. In April it was easier. A girl who had followed the college counselors' advice and applied to a range of schools was likely to get accepted somewhere, and good news had a way of eclipsing the bad. Wagner encouraged the counselors to keep early applications to a minimum. She advised families that it was easier for a girl to "keep her head" when she did not feel that her future rode on a single envelope.

Talk of process did little to dissuade the seniors or their parents, though. The percentage of girls who applied early had risen steadily over the past seven years; over one-third of the girls in the auditorium that day hoped to get the application process over with as quickly as possible. Early decision, once the province of the exceptional student, was now the frantic playground of girls who were wary of being left out.

From All Girls: Single Sex Education and Why it Matters by Karen Stabiner © 2002, used by permission.

About the Author

Karen Stabiner is one of the most respected journalists writing today about health, women's and family issues. She is a frequent contributor on these topics to such major publications as Vogue, O, Redbook, The New Yorker, Los Angeles Magazine, The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times. She has also written about food for Travel & Leisure, Gourmet and Saveur.