Recent reports and developments have shown that girls have scored better than boys in the past twenty years in exams. The change in examination system is to have final exams as opposed to exams in smaller units. Teachers protested that this will decrease the level of confidence that girls harbor, therein, will be of detriment to them. The debate has been continuing for quite some time now, but Education Secretary Michael Gove is not ready to give in to the motion of this idea being biased. He is convinced that this is more effective method of examining children and chances are that this will not affect girls’ performances.
Geoff Venn, a former examiner analyzed this situation as troublesome as girls had been thoroughly performing well than boys and the whole purpose of GCSE was to test children along with the completion of their courses as opposed to final exams. He also argued that 14-16 year old girls pick up more pressure as opposed to boys and therefore, this will deter their performance in the exams. He also said that boys would be more confident with taking finals because they would be more “adventurous” while attempting the paper. How final exams promoted rote learning, which was essentially what GCSE was against to begin with, The Telegraph reported. He further talked about how girls did well in the Science GCSEs, and this would just bring down the entire benchmark that they had set in the past twenty years.
The Daily Mail analyzed the level of confidence that would go down amongst girls once these exams take place, since they do not understand the end of year evaluation system that mostly promotes rote learning. This would also generally hinder performance and take away the essence of education itself. The idea of inculcating knowledge into children’s brains was the essential reason as to why the end of month courses sounded like a better idea to begin with. Not only will boys score better on a bad scoring quota, but that will also reflect poorly on the girls for not performing up to standards. However, it is not their fault to at the first place.
The whole purpose of the two tier system was baseless and useless as stated by Michael Gove himself in 2012. So, his point of how it is a better system is moot. If girls are performing better statistically, then the State has every responsibility to ensure that they are catered to wholly. This does not include changing the examination system to the point that they start to fail and perform at a lesser mark each year.
Even if boys are not bucking up during the GCSEs through modular exams, it is State’s prerogative to find something for them at a point which does not hinder the girls’ abilities. However, the implementation of these exams is bound to cause a detriment, since it is now confirmed. One can only hope that these statistics are wrong and girls get better scores against the boys once more.
