Of Two Minds

By insisting that boys' and girls' brains are wired differently, proponents of single-sex education are selling all kids short.

- By Kiera Butler

ON A CRISP fall morning in 2017, veteran science teacher Mary Bozenmayer and her colleagues filed into the cafeteria of their New Jersey middle school for an all-day professional development session. The speaker took the podium, smiled brightly, and explained that he was there to tell them how boys and girls think differently.

Bozenmayer was skeptical. Given her scientific training, she knew that most theories about sex-related brain differences had been debunked long ago. Still, she tried to keep an open mind as the trainer, who worked for an organization called the Gurian Institute, told the teachers that girls learn best by sitting quietly and following directions while boys require competition and physical activity to master difficult concepts. “Males can store trivia (like sports statistics) better than females, and for a longer period of time,” read a card he handed out. Another stated, “Boys take longer to process emotions than girls, making them generally emotionally fragile.” Modern classrooms, the trainer said, cater to girls’ learning style—and as a result, he concluded, girls are succeeding in school while boys are falling dangerously behind.

This didn’t sit right with Bozenmayer, so she raised her hand and asked, “If boys are struggling so much, then why are we still seeing women underrepresented in Congress, in Fortune 500 companies?” The trainer responded by repeating his talking points. “I felt my blood pressure going up,” Bozenmayer recalls. “I was like, this just seems too skewed.” Yet when she looked around the room, she saw many of her male and female colleagues nodding in agreement, diligently sifting through the cards and taking notes.