Boys are behind at every level of education, in every area, at every age, and in every country in the west, with a few small exceptions. You might be reading this for the first time, but this is not a new thing. In fact, boys have been quietly falling further and futher behind girls for more than 35 years, and now, are even further behind in education than women were 50 years ago.
Yet, if we ever do hear this discussed, it’s only ever to suggest that ‘boys need to try harder’.
But this is not the problem.
Boys are trying, the problem is, the way school educates and grades children, systemically discriminates against boys.
We saw this when the UK cancelled exams during COVID, within the so-called ‘girl bonus’.
Where girls that were performing equally well to boys, now through the lens of teacher assessments, suddenly rocketed ahead.
We saw the same when we transitioned from the objective exams of O-levels, to the subjective assessments of GCSES.
And we saw it again, when the OECD documented the same teacher bias across more than 60 countries, stating the gap “had little to do with ability”.
Yes, it’s true. Teachers (of both sexes) are biased against boys, and until that changes, nothing else will. So, who will dare talk about systemic sexism against boys?
What do you think?
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2026-06-03