Massive decline in English A-level take-up thanks to Gove reforms

[noblegiraffe]

One for @piggywaspushed who warned of this.

Take-up of English A-levels has declined massively since 2016. There has also been a decrease in the take-up of Maths and Further Maths A-levels after years of steady increases (and the country cannot afford this).

Good job everyone. Well done.

Full figures here: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/803906/Provisional_entries_for_GCSE__AS_and_A_level_summer_2019_exam_series.pdf

Maybe I am wrong but the initial statistic might not explain the full story. What if under the previous 'easier' regime more students did English & Maths? Maybe under the new more rigorous regime only the relevant children do English and Maths?

Where are the stats about the number of children who utilise their English and Maths A-level? Has that that dropped? Its more complicated surely?

Overall, the number of A level entries has fallen by 2%, presumably in line with the smaller cohort. Yet biology, chemistry, physics and computing entries have all increased, which sounds like good news.

Yes, Maths is down, but it is still, by some way, the subject with the highest number of A level entries.

Maybe under the new more rigorous regime only the relevant children do English and Maths?

If you’re suggesting that students unsuited to maths and English A-level are now being put off at GCSE, this doesn’t explain the decline as previously they would have been put off at the end of Y12 and dropped it as their 4th A-level, cashing it in as an AS.

It is bad news for the country that maths and further maths have dropped and people will be watching closely to see if this continues. Last time this happened they ended up making it easier to improve uptake.

previously they would have been put off at the end of Y12 and dropped it as their 4th A-level, cashing it in as an AS.

That is closer to what I was suggesting.

What I was trying to suggest was. Is their evidence that less children are pursing a career in Maths and English after leaving school? The numbers doing a school exam are secondary, surely!

Bit hard to tell when they have only just sat their A-levels!

A reduced pool of people who have sat maths (and further maths) A-level is bad news for a lot of university courses though, and down the line for e.g. maths specialist teachers in primary schools.

It's interesting that maths fell when maths+ science is a popular combination.

Could schools have increased the minimum grade requirement for A-level? Perhaps candidates are going for other maths qualifications instead to guarantee the pass?

My dd wouldn't pick English as she found GCSE very dull. She enjoyed the Creative Writing part of the exam and enjoyed some of the texts but the poetry and rigidness of the exam has put her off.

I have a degree in English and tbh it is hard to get a job with it. Am now retraining in a scientific role.

Can maths have been adfected by the number of pupils taking 4 Alevels, where either maths, or FM be the 'extra'.

If taking three, maths and FM becomes very narrow.

noble , by cult of STEM, I really mean cult of science (and computing : which is the one I really don't get as it is so roundly badly taught in schools!)

Why now do students 'choose' A Levels because of employment and because it's 'good for the country'? That is certainly quite a new rhetoric.

I may be being precious but I don't think the new GCSE Lit is any more boring than most of the others. It may be more the 'exam treadmill' way it is taught in many schools : but it really isn't so hugely different from specs of old. Science is the one with gazillions of exams and yet they continue to take it. This actually leads to a lot of unwise decisions : and to many students actually unsuited to science flopping in year 12.
I met someone only yesterday who was repeating his year 12 having crashed out in year 12 : he had chosen sciences. he now does two hums and computing and hates computing...

@noblegiraffe thanks for sharing the link to the tables. It’s really interesting to see the variations between the most and least popular subjects.
Looking at what DD studied, the numbers have fallen by around 10% in 2 of the 3 A levels. Not surprising given she’s studied 3 humanities as that what she enjoys and is good at, whereas the perceived wisdom is to push STEM as highlighted upthread.

Is part of the issue down to costs of university now? My parents were very happy (and able) to pay my tuition fees for me to go off and study English and philosophy at uni, back when it was £1500 a year. I'm
Not sure if they'd see that as such a good investment at £9000 a year - unless I wanted to be a teacher for example.

Is it because now you need to make uni "worth it" and have a degree that leads into more of a definite career?

It's turning the clock back to the 1980s, and what A level meant then

Whoever stopped grade inflation was going to attract criticism - because that's an end to the effortless way of making education policy look good. It wouid have been better if expectations of learned content had remained more consistent.

In our school only top set study Lit to GCSE. The highest grade from lit or lang counts double for progress 8 so SLT decided to spend 5 years preparing students for the language course.

I think Sar302 has a good point - what uni courses are now seen as "better value"? £9000 is a lot, and certainly traditionally humanities subjects had fewer taught hours and a lot more time you had to self motivate yourself to do the reading - maybe it just doesn't seem worth paying so much for that?

But if you don’t get a decent job you don’t pay anything, do you? I think the misunderstanding of the loans system also is a driver towards STEM subjects and perceived employability. Therefore I don’t believe it’s the English syllabus at all. It’s jobs and loan driven. STEM equals jobs and that’s why the decision is made regarding A levels. Film, English and Arts are down the bottom of the grad earnings tables, hence the problem.

I think it partly is that , yes. Plus a 'demonisation' of some of the jobs those grads are most likely to go into : teaching, for example!

There are actually loads of jobs in film ; it's a growth industry in the UK. But , true, more done for love than money. I do think that is a lot of what has changed in mindset and attitude.

I never hear the girls I teach explain why they want to do sciences very coherently. Normally they are half baked, secondhand feminist notions that is somehow makes them more clever or more worthwhile in society. A few mention money but it's not the driver. It still links to worth in a more nebulous sense. Perhaps English seems 'worthless' in too many sense and too abstract. If it was all about employability and earnings, history would have seen as big a drop.

I do repeat : kids don't read these days. Nor do their parents. Nor do a lot of teachers. There is less reading for pleasure at primary schools even.

teachermaths, that is utterly bonkers.

Whoever stopped grade inflation was going to attract criticism

Grade inflation was stopped in 2012 with comparable outcomes. The reforms to GCSE and A-level were a separate issue, especially as with comparable outcomes the pass rate for the old and new exams remained exactly the same.

I thought to get double the grade in Lang you had to achieve a grade in Lit (even a 1). Are they entering but not preparing for it at all?

English Lit is the most popular A level in dd’s School. But it’s a school children who have a talent in the arts attend. Often they have found they can’t access the arts subjects in mainstream schools.

rancid but it isn't turning the clock back to the 80s.... that would be when English Lit A Level was at its height. It was the most popular A Level and degree in the late 80s and competition for uni places was ferocious.

noblegiraffe - why is the maths A level awful now?

"In our school only top set study Lit to GCSE"

That's unusual. At DD's school students of every ability took English lit.

DD reads for pleasure, and found that doing English lit at GCSE just sucked all the joy out of reading, and I'm afraid I agreed with her. Fortunately she used BBC Bitesize to memorise the salient points on the poetry part and scored an A. Like me she hates poetry.

She much prefers subjects with clear cut rational answers that are either right or wrong, rather than subjects with fluffy, opinion based anwers where there is not really a right or wrong answer.

And, again, that's fair enough tapas. She is the type of student who would not be suited to English Lit A Level.

It's not fluffy from my side of the mark scheme