The Paula Principle

Paula learning

Women achieve higher levels of competence than men through education and training

Aspirations and ambitions

In Winifred Holtby's South Riding, published in 1936,  Lydia Holly is the eldest daughter of a large and poor family living in a converted railway carriage.  She is 'an untidy fat loutish girl in a torn overall' - but she shows evident signs of cleverness, and her mother sees this.  "Her mother  was a fighter; her mother had insisted  that she take the second chance of a scholarship to Kiplington High School.  When she was eleven she had  won a place at Kiplington, but her parents had needed her to escort her small sisters to the village school, so she had missed her chance.  Now Daisy was old enough to…
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Measuring education: learning curves and black boxes

The Economic Intelligence Unit has just published The Learning Curve, which will certainly attract much attention.  The report looks at international evidence on educational performance - or, I should say, on school system performance, since it concentrates wholly on schools, a familiar if frustrating pattern for those of us concerned with lifelong learning.  Having had my minor  beef about that, I want to say that overall the report marks a big step forward in how we ought to approach the measurement of educational performance. My first big cheer is for the report's explicit declaration of humility in the face of complexity.  Those involved have undeniably a very high level of…
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Parental aspirations: a pair of literary examples

Parental aspirations are a powerful influence on educational achievement. They must also have some effect on what kinds of job young people want to do, though I'm not sure what the research shows on this. We do know from Ingrid Schoon's analysis of cohort data that girls' aspirations are higher than boys, at all levels of socio-economic status. (Schoon also shows that for the generation born in 1970 the class gap in aspirations is wider than is was for those born 12 years earlier; once again we have trends in gender and class pointing in different directions.) I have been looking generally for passages from literature whic illustrate the Paula…
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Aspirations and ambitions

In Winifred Holtby's South Riding, published in 1936,  Lydia Holly is the eldest daughter of a large and poor family living in a converted railway carriage.  She is 'an untidy fat loutish girl in a torn overall' - but she shows evident signs of cleverness, and her mother sees this.  "Her mother  was a fighter; her mother had insisted  that she take the second chance of a scholarship to Kiplington High School.  When she was eleven she had  won a place at Kiplington, but her parents had needed her to escort her small sisters to the village school, so she had missed her chance.  Now Daisy was old enough to…
Read More

Measuring education: learning curves and black boxes

The Economic Intelligence Unit has just published The Learning Curve, which will certainly attract much attention.  The report looks at international evidence on educational performance - or, I should say, on school system performance, since it concentrates wholly on schools, a familiar if frustrating pattern for those of us concerned with lifelong learning.  Having had my minor  beef about that, I want to say that overall the report marks a big step forward in how we ought to approach the measurement of educational performance. My first big cheer is for the report's explicit declaration of humility in the face of complexity.  Those involved have undeniably a very high level of…
Read More

Parental aspirations: a pair of literary examples

Parental aspirations are a powerful influence on educational achievement. They must also have some effect on what kinds of job young people want to do, though I'm not sure what the research shows on this. We do know from Ingrid Schoon's analysis of cohort data that girls' aspirations are higher than boys, at all levels of socio-economic status. (Schoon also shows that for the generation born in 1970 the class gap in aspirations is wider than is was for those born 12 years earlier; once again we have trends in gender and class pointing in different directions.) I have been looking generally for passages from literature whic illustrate the Paula…
Read More

Aspirations and ambitions

In Winifred Holtby's South Riding, published in 1936,  Lydia Holly is the eldest daughter of a large and poor family living in a converted railway carriage.  She is 'an untidy fat loutish girl in a torn overall' - but she shows evident signs of cleverness, and her mother sees this.  "Her mother  was a fighter; her mother had insisted  that she take the second chance of a scholarship to Kiplington High School.  When she was eleven she had  won a place at Kiplington, but her parents had needed her to escort her small sisters to the village school, so she had missed her chance.  Now Daisy was old enough to…
Read More

Measuring education: learning curves and black boxes

The Economic Intelligence Unit has just published The Learning Curve, which will certainly attract much attention.  The report looks at international evidence on educational performance - or, I should say, on school system performance, since it concentrates wholly on schools, a familiar if frustrating pattern for those of us concerned with lifelong learning.  Having had my minor  beef about that, I want to say that overall the report marks a big step forward in how we ought to approach the measurement of educational performance. My first big cheer is for the report's explicit declaration of humility in the face of complexity.  Those involved have undeniably a very high level of…
Read More

Parental aspirations: a pair of literary examples

Parental aspirations are a powerful influence on educational achievement. They must also have some effect on what kinds of job young people want to do, though I'm not sure what the research shows on this. We do know from Ingrid Schoon's analysis of cohort data that girls' aspirations are higher than boys, at all levels of socio-economic status. (Schoon also shows that for the generation born in 1970 the class gap in aspirations is wider than is was for those born 12 years earlier; once again we have trends in gender and class pointing in different directions.) I have been looking generally for passages from literature whic illustrate the Paula…
Read More