1/2 of all state schools have no girls sitting physics A level

[Himalaya]

Just listening on the radio.

Thoughts? Experience? Ideas?

I didn't want to carry on with physics at school because it would have meant spending several hours a week in a lab with a hairy teacher with BO and bad breath and an obsession with bicycles and a lot of spotty smelly teenaged boys. Italian with a glamorous lady teacher and fragrant teenaged girls seemed so much more appealing.

This.

I really loved physics. You would have to to get past the above. That makes people like me in the minority. However it is a negative feedback loop - the less women involved, the less women want to get involved.

And don't even get me started about the EU's recent "It's a girl thing" campaign.

frieda Oh dear lord [shakes head in bafflement]

Part of the reason for the dearth of girls doing physics A level is the small number of subjects allowed. Girls who are thinking of a science-based career are, I think, more likely to tend to the biological and medical sciences. So Biology and Chemistry are essential; then if you're only allowed 3 A levels maths is probably a better choice than physics. Ideally you would be allowed to do all 3 sciences plus maths. In my day we could only do 4 if they were chemistry, physics, pure maths and applied maths - which, as wanted to do a chemistry degree suited me fine. All the other girls doing sciences did chem, biol and maths with stats. So I was the only girl in the school doing physics, the only one in my set doing chemistry and one other girl did the double maths. Fortunately it didn't bother me at all as I was better than the lads.

But I'm glad my DD decided to go to a girls' GS with a science specialism. They all do triple science GCSE and lots of them go on to do sciences, I think quite a few are allowed to do 4 subjects all the way to A level. AFAIK they have good science teachers (several with PhDs) in all subjects. She's going to do electronics and computer science GCSEs too, lucky child! She's almost bound to head towards some sort of science or engineering career.

I used to hate it when people described physics as "unimaginative" or "uncreative"

Scientists are the most creative people there are. We know that, don't worry about people who say things like this, they are just exposing their own sad ignorance and shallowness.

There were a lot of girls in my A-level physics class, but then the school was very strong on science anyway.

My education experiences:

State mixed primary in the north east 1989-1993: don't remember doing any science at all. This may have had something to do with the fact that in 1st and 3rd years we did NO MATHS and so 2nd and 4th years were spent desperately trying to get us up to speed on maths.

Selective independent girls' school 1993-2000: hugely science-oriented and with no shortage of girls doing science. All our science teachers were women. I would say that about half of my year group went on to do science, medicine or maths at university. I think at A Level Chemistry was the most widely studied science subject and Physics the least, but there was still a healthy number of people doing Physics. I think (but couldn't swear to it) that we all had to do all three sciences at GCSE - I certainly did - which I'm sure has a huge effect - do state schools still do that weird dual science thing?

Raise your sons and daughters to be feminists and send your daughters to single sex schools, is my motto.

grimma very cool! Good on your DD!

nutella this is exactly the kind of thing the IOP are referencing in their report today - how to create a self-sustaining culture.

Phyllis [nods sagely] I am beginning to tumble to the single sex route too (Have a DD and a DS)

LRD asked

"Does anyone know what the gender distribution of teachers is?"

No idea! But, I know I am incredibly rare [preens]

Not only am I a female physics teacher - I am a female physics teacher with a pure physics degree. Just physics grads are in the tiny minority - most are engineers of some sort or another.

Thank you for the info!

That is a pity about physics teachers with physics degrees - I'm sure engineers could be great teachers (I'm not knocking engineering), but you'd wish more people wanted to teach.

I teach A-level Physics in a girls' school.

We don't have any inhibitions about being female and doing physics. The main impediment to the subject is that there are very few 'must have physics' as a career choice. Mostly it is seen as a great facilitating subject. If students are going for a mixed arts/science portfolio, they will tend to go for Chemistry, as the central science.

I personally think that Physics is by far the easiest of the three sciences, especially if taken just to AS-level

I think what we really need to do is to promote Engineering as a valid and exciting career choice for women. If nothing else, it is a fantastic degree which will open doors.

do state schools still do that weird dual science thing?

Some private schools do it too, you know.
The norm is for the top set(s) to do triple and lower sets do double. One supposedly excellent private girls school I know of only offers double science - that really is appalling.

and another one from me then I'll stop

upthread orangeandgold said

That the problem with Physics, sexist though it is, that sort of dry abstract detail doesn't hold most girls concentration.

With the very greatest of respect, I am going to call you on this - what is so inherently different about the female brain that struggles with the maths? I humbly suggest you had a p* poor lecturer and that many physics lectures at degree are entirely chalk and talk with no two way reciprocity.

But that aside - that is degree and this is A Level.

I think what we really need to do is to promote Engineering as a valid and exciting career choice for women

'Engineering' encompasses a huge variety of career choices, some probably more attractive to women than others.

That the problem with Physics, sexist though it is, that sort of dry abstract detail doesn't hold most girls concentration.

If its not holding the girls' concentration, it wont be holding the boys' either.

Is there any breakdown of results? I would take a small bet that of the girls who do do physics, more get good grades than boys. Girls who do it are likely to have the ability and motivation; boys are, I suspect, likely to have more of a mix of ability from excellent to scrape-throughs. There were an awful lot of boys in my physics class who got poor grades but they would probably have fared no better, or worse, in essay subjects.

grimma - yeah there should be data on this in the IOP's site. Will go a hunting. :D

My personal experience of this is not being allowed to take physics at school as the subject was popular with boys and there simply wasn't space for a girl even if, like me, she was good at it, liked it and wanted to learn more. I was told I could do art or history instead. The teacher explained I was more likely to waste the place by getting married and not working, so it was important to support the boys. This was a secondary school comp in the mid eighties in Surrey. Lovely.

Ooh, a physics thread! I did Physics A level, along with Maths and English. I was the only girl in a class of 8 doing Physics, and there was only one boy in a class of 16 doing English. This was in a bog standard large comprehensive with its own sixth form. One of the reasons I did Physics was because it was seen to be a boys' subject. I was always contrary and rather feminist.

I went on to do a degree in Physics in the middle of the eighties. There were 4 girls out of 60 students. (And I agree with the poster above, the odds were good, but the goods were odd! ) My best friend was doing a maths degree, with a 50/50 gender split.

My STBEX has a maths degree, and we have one DS with ASD, one geeky DS and one very quirky DS. So that's one reason why girls shouldn't do Physics, they are more likely to breed with a geek! I'm allowed to say this!

my physics teacher at school told my parents 'ithink will never be a scientist, its not her forte'. i took physics and biology gcse but did chemistry at night school. i started art a levels but dropped out at age 16. i returned to education later; i now have a BSC (hons) 2:1 and an /MSc; i have been an engineer for 7 years

to be fair, physics was really boring at school (teachers fault? 1970s-80s education?) it wasnt until later that i realised how interesting and relevant physics is

in my experience/opinion, it is about how physics is delivered; it doesnt need to be girlie just relevant to life....and as it is sooooo relevant to almost everything, isnt it a bit of a teaching travesty that more people arent interested?

Lavender and ithink - what appalling attitudes . At least the sheer discrimination LH suffered wouldn't be allowed now (would it?).

I was probably fortunate that, apart from not just being good I was usually best (I need a big-head emoticon, but its true), and my dad was a chemistry teacher so I didn't get sexist crap - science obviously ran in the family.

I did physics, chemistry and Maths ( pure and applied) @ a level. Love all of them except organic chemistry as it was so hard to remember all the nomenclature.
We had 3 girls in the physics class and 2 in Maths. Chemistry had a little better ratio.
My first day at uni. I was the only girl and 50 or so boys.
I got the mik taken out of in lab exercises. Usual boy/girl tension and a little sexism.
Has made me what I am today.
A very successful engineer.

My eldest DD took Physics at A Level (also Maths, Chemistry and German). She is now doing a masters degree in Mechanical Engineering - currently on a one year placement with a top car company. She is having a GREAT time. It is a male dominated domain but this isn't phasing her at all. Tomorrow she is 'off-roading' with her new dept (team building). She is really enjoying being surrounded by like-minded individuals.

Just to add - my daughter went to a standard co-ed secondary school - and the local sixth form college.

I did a study on girls' views on science as part of my teacher training. By the end of Primary it is already established in children's minds that science is seen as more suitable for boys than girls. The difference in views gets wider and wider as they progress through secondary. The girls who do study science tend to favour biology. Boys tend to not do biology.

Lots of different theories as to the source of this. One idea is that pre-school games and activities at home are different - boys build stuff and girls cuddle pets. Media projects the stereotype of the 'mad scientist' being a middle-aged man in a white coat with test tubes... Ask any primary-aged child to draw you a scientist :-)

There are also theories of differences in brain functions that support boys being better at recall of theory and facts, which means that they find physics easier than girls do.

Another theory is simply that the majority of primary teachers are female and very few teachers are scientists. So girls do not see female scientific role models, so the cycle continues.

I have a science background (albeit biology!). When I was doing my research the class teacher I worked with also had a scientific background. When I conducted the Draw a Scientist Test, the boys drew the stereotype, but the girls all drew women. Maybe there is hope to break the mould, one class at a time