The Downfall of Boys

In recent years, girls have significantly outperformed boys on national exams in the United Kingdom (Herald Series, August 15, 2025). On the 2024 GCSE exam, for example, almost 25 percent of girls earned a grade 7/A or higher, versus only 19 percent of boys. As Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham, noted, “The apparent under-performance of boys at this stage of education should be a matter of national concern.”

Significantly lower performance by boys is a chronic situation and not just a one-time event. Last year, the Education Committee, comprised of members of the British parliament, launched an investigation into why boys are underperforming girls academically. In addition to commenting on problematic academic performance, their research also highlighted that boys were almost twice as likely to be suspended from school and that girls both attend and graduate from university at greater rates than boys (UK Parliament, April 19, 2025). As the Education Committee chair warned, “Evidence has consistently shown that half the children in this country do worse at school than the other. What divides them is their gender. My Committee wants to find out why it is that boys have historically underperformed compared with girls. Given the Government’s recent focus on lifelong learning, it is also concerning that growing numbers of young men are dropping out of education and becoming NEET,” that is, “Not in Education, Employment, or Training”—essentially, an unemployed young adult who is not receiving any sort of educational or vocational training at all.

In recent decades, boys have been viewed as inappropriately “privileged,” resulting in much more emphasis placed on the success of girls in education. The result is what we are witnessing today and a phenomenon that author Hanna Rosin called “The End of Men” (The Atlantic, July/August 2010). This phenomenon is not unlike one predicted by the Bible to occur at the end of the age (Isaiah 3:12). To learn more about this concerning trend, watch “Do Schools Discriminate Against Boys?”