On November 8, 2021, Erika Kitzmiller, term assistant professor of education, published a chapter in New Perspectives on the History of the Twentieth-Century American High School, titled “Gendered Anxieties Pave the Way for a Separate and Unequal Co-educational High School.” In her contribution to this new book, Professor Kitzmiller explores how anxieties about the dangers that city life could pose for middle- and upper-class school girls influenced when and where high schools were built, including Philadelphia’s Germantown High School.
She also discusses how these anxieties shaped the foundation of this co-educational institution’s opening with its unequal educational opportunities for female and male students. For many years, unequal access to educational opportunities was common among high schools across the United States. Much of the research for this chapter overlaps with scholarly work for Professor Kitzmiller’s forthcoming book, titled “The Roots of Educational Inequality.”