ABSTRACT
One of the more recent educational surprises has been the questioning of coeducation and the re-examination of single sex schooling. The interaction of class and sexual divisions is fundamental to the nature and direction of educational change. Selective education preserves a class domination through control of educational resources and means; single sex education does not secure either male or female advantage, minimally it offers a way of keeping track of resources and ensuring that they are equitably distributed. In practical terms the move from formal to informal discrimination is represented by the shift from the explicitly selective and class based grammar/secondary modern arrangement to the only implicitly selective mixed comprehensive pattern. The overall result has been a much closer interplay between class and sexual divisions in mixed comprehensives, making it hard to distinguish their separate effects.
