Oxford exams go into extra time to help women

‘Perform worse with men in the room’

StUDEntS at oxford University were given longer to complete maths exams to help women achieve higher grades, it was revealed yesterday.

the rules were introduced by the mathematics and computer sciences departments last summer , in response to a widening gender results gap.

Students were given 105 minutes to finish the papers rather than 90 minutes – and there was no change in the length or difficulty of the questions.

the university said women did better as a result because it reduced ‘the undue effects of time pressure’, which are thought to have more of an impact on female students.

helen Zha, a member of oxford’s Mirzakhani Society for women studying maths, said women were more likely to struggle with prob - lem-solving when men were in the same room.

She said: ‘one thing i’ve heard and felt is that where there are more males in the room, women will . . . perform worse than they would otherwise.’

Maths has one of the biggest variations in results of all of the subjects that are taught at oxford University.

Just seven women maths students graduated with first-class degrees last year , compared with 45 men.

this means that 21.2 per cent of women on the course achieved first- class degrees, against 45.5 per cent of men.

Maths dons at oxford looked at whether ‘shorter exams may particularly disadvantage women’ and pointed out that exams were not supposed to be ‘a time trial’.

internal documents obtained under the freedom of information act shows the decision to extend the exam times was made with the intention of reducing the disadvantage to ‘ students most sensitive to time pressure and stress.’

they stated: ‘it is thought that this might mitigate the … gender gap that has arisen in recent years, and in any case the exam should be a demon - stration of mathematical understanding and not a time trial.’

Academics say there are no gender differences in mathe - matical ability or intelligence.

But Sarah hart, a maths pro - fessor at Birkbeck , University of london and an oxford grad- uate, said she had noticed a tendency for female students to double-check their answers in their heads before suggesting them to class.

Male students were quicker to answer questions, but were more likely to get the answer wrong, she said.

She said: ‘i am a big fan of giving people as much time as they want to do exams.

‘After all, you never have to prove theorems against the clock in real life so mere speed is not what we want to assess.’

A spokesman for oxford Uni - versity said: ‘the departments are not drawing any firm conclusions from the first year’s data.

‘however, third-year female students did show an improve - ment on their secondyear marks.

‘While there is clearly more progress to be made, the departments will continue with the longer papers for the fore - seeable future, monitoring the exam data carefully.’

the change to the longer exam time follows a decision by the history department to replace a traditional exam with a ‘take - home’ paper late last year.

this was also done to try to boost the results of female students – although it was criti - cised as ‘sexist’ at the time, for implying women were the weaker sex.