I think maybe it's a bit short-sighted, actually.

Speaking as someone who taught in the middle schools for several years, and as someone who is not a Neanderthal or an advocate of "Me, Tarzan, you Jane" school of thought...I did find it helpful at times to work with groups of boys and girls apart during those sexually formative years. There are some issues that few, if any children that age will ever bring up in mixed company, and it was often easier to at least start a discussion in a sex-segregated grouping and later bring it back to the entire group...once the students were made to feel more comfortable with themselves and their questions.

You know, just because pluralism and diversity are our (laudable) goals doesn't mean we need spend every walking moment in perfectly mixed company. Sometimes we need time in self-chosen groups (as well as time alone) to get a handle on issues before we're thrust into what might be a totally uncomfortable situation.

If this negates my membership in the Liberal or Feminist Clubs, please let me know so I can stop wasting money on dues. :)

"Why Gender Matters," which argues for the biological need for boys to practice "pursuing and killing prey," and girls to "practice taking care of babies.""

This is about the deep south going more and more Taliban - next will be a dress code - for girls. And if they are just going to take care of babies, why do they need an education? When times are uncertain and changing, there is always a group of people who want to go back to a mythical time where everything was just the way it suppose to be. The golden age never existed, the deep south stereotypes of gender are damaging to both genders, and keeps everyone from ever seeing a child as an individual, but someone who must always be looked at through gender glasses.

What about the part, were it says if a boy likes reading, punish him, and push him into sports - there is a deep distrust of education going on now in the religious south, education is being viewed as an enemy of morality. This is just another version of that way of thinking. After all education teaches equality of gender, races, evolution, sex ed … and a lot of modern technology has the feel of magic to it, since the average person doesn’t know how it works. There is a feeling of a loss of control of ones environment, so coming down hard on female sexuality gives the males a sense of control, that they have lost in their daily lives.

Folks are losing earning power, even if they have a job, the world is a scary place, and the only thing that makes them safe, is dictating morality to the rest of us, and feeling morally superior.

You don't lose your feminist credentials for this. It's VERY different than what this school district wanted to do -- which was to separate boys and girls in ALL classes, ALL the time.

It's a reversal of my own experience in 7th grade in 1977, when a girlfriend and I were the first girls allowed to take Drafting instead of Sewing in our junior high school. We only did it because we hated the Home Ec teachers, one of whom tried to give me a C as my semester grade in Cooking because I dared to use a POTATO peeler on APPLES. Our vice principal -- the "Girls Vice Principal" -- tried to talk us out of it by saying that Drafting was "too hard" for girls -- even girls who many years later ended up getting graduate degrees in scientific fields from Harvard (me) and Columbia (my girlfriend). But for the first time ever, the law was on our side, not hers. Guess who the Drafting teacher loved having in his class, and guess who got the only A grades in Drafting that semester for being far superior to the other students...

I went to an all girls school for seven years growing up and I hated nearly every day of it. The girls sucked. I think that environments of all girls and all boys somehow encourage the worst behavior in both genders. In high school I switched to a co-ed school and it was so much better. I will never send a child to a single sex school and I think that it is a load of crap that girls learn better in all girl environments. Girls in all girl environments are simply more likely to be endlessly tormented by other girls who might not behave so badly if boys were around (and I think that the same holds true for boys in all boy environments). I am glad that the girl in Louisiana was able to defeat this plan.

Tell me this is a joke. Please. Please.

Ohhh..Louisiana. You just GOTTA love a place that produces a school board that makes decisions based on...hell, I don't even know how to characterize the theories of this Dr. dude.

Just tell me this was a joke and I'll feel much better.

No wonder our country is so fucked up...with states like Louisiana, it's a wonder we ever made it out of the 18th century.

I sympathize with those who are pushing single sex education these days, but ultimately I think it's a bad idea. There is too much overlap in behavior and interests between the two genders. All that is needed is a little tolerance and flexibility in the classroom. My own son doesn't like loud noises or rowdy behavior, so he is not your typical boy.

I also agree with the poster who said that single sex environments often bring out the worst qualities in people. I think this is because single sex groups create social norms that are gender specific, and often very unflattering of the opposite sex.

That said I believe that the views attributed to Dr. Leonard Sax are far from accurate.

Looking at that proposed curriculum, one thing is true: if profound gender differences didn't exist before, they certainly would after kids spent a couple of years in that scary program.

*shudders*