One junior English class period consists of 24 boys and four girls. Others have similarly skewed numbers: 20 boys and eight girls; 15 boys and nine girls. Since elementary school, the class of 2015 has contained more male students than female students.

This year’s junior class includes 123 boys and 88 girls, while the other three grades in the school have a combined 308 boys and 300 girls, counselor Chris Hartford said.

“Everybody knows that it’s a very boy-heavy class,” parent Susan Adams said.

Adams said that she initially noticed the imbalance when her child was in elementary school. The numbers have become less extreme with new students in middle school and high school, Adams said.

Likewise, junior Claire Wong said, “It’s not as glaring as it was when we were in elementary school [at Beach].”

Wong said that mixed grade level classes have decreased the severity of the imbalance.

Still, teachers with junior classes must adapt to accommodate the gender disparity.

English teacher Celia Rogers said that she notices a higher activity level and more energy in boy-heavy classes, so she plans lessons in which students can move their desks and work in groups.

Similarly, English teacher Jody Weverka said that she adjusts her teaching based on the type of energy in a class rather than the gender breakdown.

“I don’t feel that at PHS kids academically fall into stereotypical [gender] roles,” Weverka said.

Weverka said that for some students, the gender of their classmates doesn’t matter but for others, it affects their comfort level in class.

Rogers said that in classes with mostly boys, she assigns the girls to sit together to promote camaraderie.

According to Denver-based educator Amy Turino, teachers who assign small group and differentiated projects minimize the effects of a gender imbalance in a classroom.

Junior Andrew Parker said that he doesn’t feel that the disproportionate numbers of girls and boys have affected his academic or social experience.

Like Parker, junior Gates Zeng said that he knows that his grade contains more boys than girls but it has not impacted him.

“School’s still school. It doesn’t function to favor the guy or the girl,” Zeng said.

Sophomore Kaelli Thiel’s Mandarin 4 class contains six girls and 11 boys. She said that the skewed ratio does not change social dynamics, except when the class competes in games girls against boys.

“We’re kind of at a disadvantage there,” Thiel said.

Adams said that the gender imbalance has not affected academics, but it has fostered a lot of boy energy in her child’s grade.

Furthermore, junior Scott Ng said that the disproportionate ratio of males to females in his grade has influenced friendships by creating a barrier between males and females.

“More guys hang out with guys because there were fewer girls in elementary school,” Ng said.