I'll go one further on that.  You mentioned "However, for the sake of appearances, the same student could not win all the awards."  My experience as a child -and the one I point to for ruining any future concern or effort towards school- was when (6th grade in the late 80s) I was pulled aside and told that I wouldn't be getting the math award despite having earned it because they wanted a girl to get it.  So they gave the award to the best girl at math who just so happened to be a super keener who won almost all of the other awards.  

I think the lesson was supposed to be about gender parity but the only lesson that 10 year old learned was: "performance doesn't matter because "The Man" will do what it wants, when it wants".