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A tale of two schools. (Interview).

Article Excerpt
WHEN KAREN STABINER Girls: Single-Sex Education and Why It Matters hits t the bookstores soon, expect a lively debate on the subject. A feminist, Stabiner makes the case for single-sex education-a position not usually embraced by feminists- by presenting a compelling, novelistic account of a year in the lifr of two very different all-girls schools, Marlborough, an elite prep school in Los Angeles, and The Young men's Leadership School of East Harlem, or TYWLS (pronounced twills).

Some readers will disagree with Stabiner on the theories supporting single-sex education. She cites Mary Pipher of Reviving Ophelia fame, Harvard's Carol Gilligan, and scholar David Sadker to the effect that girls are shortchanged by schools in favor of boys. But a lot of research shows that the opposite is true--how can girls be failing when the majority of student leaders are girls and girls go to college at higher rates than boys?

Whatever you think about this issue, this book is a must read for anyone who cares about the fate not only of single-sex education but of education in general. In Stabiner's hands, the material becomes a rip-roaring adventure-tale in which, after many trials, at the end of the day, is an envelope, a thick one indicating that a girl has been accepted by a college, or a thin one with disappointing news. Expect to be on the edge of your seat as you worry about the fate of the girls. Needless to say, all the girls at Marlborough go to college, but--and I hope I'm not spoiling the ending-so, too, did the girls at TYWLS, except for one who opted for the military.

Stabiner talked by telephone from her residence in Santa Monica to TWQ editor Charlotte Hays.

TWQ: My favorite girl in the book was Diana, who attended TYWLS and who joked that she'd never been farther west than Harlem. She said that if wearing a uniform and exhausting herself with school work was the only way to get somewhere, that was what she was willing to do. How did single-sex education help this girl?

STABINER: People who are skeptical of single-sex education would say that the Harlem school did nothing for Diana that was any different from what any good, progressive...

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