A Single Sex Education On A Coed Campus

Sacred Heart education is unique in Chicago in that it is a purposeful blend of single sex and coeducational approaches. 

At Sacred Heart, we believe that self-confidence is built on a daily basis. Single sex classrooms, when coupled with opportunities for boys and girls to know one another and work together, allow students to grow secure in their abilities and comfortable in expressing themselves.

Children start school together in our coed Kindergarten, but beginning in first grade, move on to single gender classrooms. While the boys and girls are in separate classes, they follow the same plan of studies and are exposed to an identical curriculum. Boys' and girls' classrooms are located close to one another whenever possible in order to facilitate interaction, including weekly shared projects at grade level.

Why single sex? A growing body of research supports what Sacred Heart has known all along – that single sex education offers both girls and boys supportive environments attuned to their individual needs, encouraging success in school.

Discussion flows more freely in a single sex classroom. Students are more willing to take intellectual risks and gain from those experiences a greater self-confidence. Children are not narrowly defined by gender stereotypes in the single sex classroom. Instead boys and girls feel free to explore their full range of interests, from art and music to math and the hard sciences.

Beyond the classroom, boys and girls interact regularly throughout the day – in the halls, on the playground, in the lunchroom and during extracurricular and community service activities – benefiting from the positive socialization experiences available in a coed setting.