Thursday 19 August 2010

Usain Bolt Twists The Space-Time Continuum

My delightful A-level tutee phoned this morning in a (mainly fake) thundering rage, because he's done so well this morning that he can't skip out of his first university choice and go to his second, which has with hindsight become his favourite.

Well, caveat emptor, I say (and I know he's delighted with his results, if not their side-effects); I at least can view this with unvarnished pride, having gotten him up two grades in reasonably short order. I am thus dreading taking a look at the papers today, since I have no doubt I will learn that either a) he only did so well because the exams have gotten so easy, or b) he only did so well because his teacher was failing him and I was there to pick up the pieces. These, of course, are the only two possible stories to be told when there is a variation in the pass rate from the year before, which is to say every single year.

I prefer it when it's a), to be honest. It always bugged me that my younger brother got much better sprinting times than I did when we were at school. It comes as a great relief to learn that that's only because metres had gotten shorter.

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