The government announced a policy of gender segregation at the university level a few weeks ago told campuses to start doing so this fall. Sanati Sharif is the first university to announce what it will do.
Primary and secondary education have been segregated since the revolution, but higher education has never been impacted until now.
The Mehr news agency quoted Reza Rusta-zadeh, chancellor of Sanati Sharif, as saying, “When students enter the university from high school, they experience a shock, which even leads families to seek assistance from us. Therefore, we have considered making some changes to the programs offered for first-year students.”
He did not indicate if gender segregation would advance to sophomore classes next year and continue rolling through the years.
He indicated there would be some exceptions to the freshmen segregation, presumably in cases where classes are very small.