In November 2013, in the report ‘Maintaining curiosity’, Ofsted recommended that:
“Secondary schools monitor and evaluate the progression of different groups of pupils and their continuation to science-related pathways in education… against the national proportions for those groups.”
Until now there has been no single source of data for schools or inspectors to consult that sets out the numbers and proportions of girls and boys that progress from Year 11 to AS levels and then from AS to A level. This report provides that data, so that schools can compare their own performance against the national picture. Several subjects have significantly unequal numbers of girls and boys, for example physics.