Arts & Humanities Lecture Series
Wednesday, September 26
6:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Wahlberg Recital Hall
Learning Like a Girl
Educating Our Daughters in Schools of Their Own
West Coast Book Tour
Dr. Diana Meehan, B.A. English
1966
Author,
Educator, Presidential Advisor,
Documentary Producer
Faced with a spirited eleven-year-old daughter, a concern about what therapists
have called a ‘poisonous' youth culture— especially for girls—and
a conviction that parents need powerful tools to help their daughters realize
their potential, educator-activist Diana Meehan decided with two other
mothers to create a new school based on social science and brain research
about how girls learn best. The result, The Archer School in L.A., has
in only ten years become a model for girls' schools nationwide. In this
entertaining, inspiring book, Meehan describes her journey to create a
new institution to serve girls first and foremost, while laying out through
vivid stories and examples what girls need to thrive. She explains why
co-education so often doesn't serve them (just as it doesn't serve boys),
takes sides in the controversy over male/female learning differences, and
advocates for schools’ role in giving girls tools to navigate through
our sexualized, materialistic culture. She also visits other schools around
the country—private and public—to show how single sex education
works, and how every girl everywhere can benefit from having a classroom
of her own.
Biographical Sketch
Diana Meehan, Ph.D., is the co-founder of the Archer School for Girls
and founding-director of the Institute for the Study of Women and Men at
USC. She currently serves on the Board of the Schlesinger Library at Harvard,
the Children's Action Network, and the Communication Consortium Media Center.
Meehan is a founding partner of VU Productions—a documentary film
company attached to Paramount. Among her award-winning productions are Women
in War (A&E) and A Century of Women (Turner Broadcasting).
She is married to writer-producer Gary David Goldberg.