All-Girl Math Classes Are OK as Long as They’re Renamed

Ventura schools can continue to offer all-girl math classes--they just can’t call them that, federal civil rights investigators told a district that has drawn national attention for its sex-segregated classes.

Instead of “all-girl,” try “classes for the mathematically challenged,” federal officials suggested in discussions with Ventura educators.

“They didn’t sound like they were joking,” said Patricia Chandler, who oversees curriculum for the Ventura Unified School District.

A letter that arrived Monday formally ended a brief dispute between Ventura school officials and investigators in the U.S. Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights. Federal officials launched an inquiry in January into sex-segregated classes at two Ventura schools after someone complained that the practice discriminated against boys.

Ironically, the program does allow boys to enroll; there is one boy among its 360 students districtwide. But recruiting efforts, until now, have been aimed mainly at girls and have referred, informally, to the courses as all-girl math.

Federal investigators declined, as a matter of policy, to identify the person who objected to the Ventura program. And Ventura officials said they have no idea who complained, adding that parents have shown strong support for the single-sex classes, which began in 1993.

The Ventura district won nationwide attention for the classes, including stories on CNN and network newscasts and in dozens of newspapers nationwide.

Anacapa Middle School, which offers all-girl courses, was targeted for a study on the benefits of teaching boys and girls separately. And the American Assn. of University Women awarded a $10,000 grant to Christine Mikles, a teacher who pioneered the courses at Ventura High.

Educators at both schools contend that segregating the sexes in math may help reduce girls’ fear of the subject and improve their performance.

Studies consistently show that girls’ interest in upper-level math and science courses falls off markedly starting around the seventh grade, educators say.

Same-sex classes give girls a feeling of security and encourage them to participate in class discussions, Mikles said. The number of girls enrolled in trigonometry has grown from 28 in 1994 to 51 this year, a change Mikles attributes to the success of the two female-only classes offered last year.

“The all-girl classes are outperforming some of my co-ed classes,” she said.

After examining the Ventura district’s 70-page response to the civil rights complaint, federal investigators determined that no discrimination had taken place.

“We can laugh about it now,” Chandler said. “But I don’t know what we’re going to end up calling it informally.”

Mikles, too, is semantically challenged by the task: “Maybe we’ll call it enriched. Gender enriched,” she said. “Gee, I don’t know if that would be OK because it includes the word gender .”