Single-sex schools vs mixed enrolment: what's best for schoolchildren?

As more and more schools move away from gender segregation, parents and teachers have their say on what’s really best for students – single sex or coeducation.

More than two dozen school communities in Ireland have moved from single sex to coeducation since 2020.

Ireland is an outlier in its tendency to segregate children by gender, but there is a growing movement away from it. More than two dozen of our school communities have moved from single sex to coeducation since 2020.

A myth has circulated for some time — that single sex schools were more effective academically, particularly for girls. However, an analysis of data from 5,000 15-year-olds in Ireland published in 2023, found “no academic advantage” for attending single-sexed or mixed-sex schools.