Bring back the boys

On the news today: we may be about to see a shift in emphasis from coursework to exams, in the UK national qualifications for 16 year olds. First, a few weeks ago, it was announced that coursework will be reduced in some subjects because of concerns about cheating. Second, and new today, there’s pressure for the government to allow an alternative “international” qualification, already popular in some private schools, in the state sector.

Here’s a prediction: a move from coursework assessment to exams will improve boys results relative to girls.

That calls for some context. The most widely reported context is that, for some years, published statistics have shown girls significantly outperforming boys at school.

The background to that, and what made it inevitable, is the Agenda of promoting womens issues, that has been dominant in this country’s culture since the middle of the last century. It’s one of those things that’s taken as an article of faith by our Powers That Be, and can’t be questioned. The move from exams to coursework was in part tied in with that agenda: at the time, boys were outperforming girls, and some commentators rightly predicted that the changes (of which coursework was an important part) would help close that gap.

reverse proxy article

Back in the summer, Mark Cox wrote to me about finding a new home for the ApacheWeek article on running a reverse proxy “sometime this year”. I’ve just dumped the apacheweek article as text and imported it in to apachetutor.

The article’s new home is here.