2022 A-Level students were the first since before the COVID-19 pandemic to sit their exams in a hall. This has probably contributed the drop in the number of girls achieving grades A or A* in STEM subjects compared with 2021. As a result we have looked at the year-on-year comparison as well as a comparison with 2019. In total, there were 465,017 female A-Level STEM entrants this year, up from 454,731 in 2021, and 432,289 in 2019. The 2022 figure was a 2.5% increase on 2019.
Points of note
- Number of A and A* STEM passes achieved by girls was down on last year, but up on 2019 – the last year students sat their exams in a hall.
- Number of girls taking A-Level STEM subjects has increased by 2.5% compared with 2019.
The top grades
The following statistics show the number of girls achieving the top grades in A-Level STEM subjects:
- Physics: 40.1% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 13.2% from last year, but an increase of 11.4% from 2019.
- Maths: 48.5% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 9.3% from last year, but an increase of 9.4% from 2019.
- Further Maths: 65.4% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 12.1% from last year, but an increase of 14.4% from 2019.
- Chemistry: 37.8% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 12.1% from last year, but an increase of 10.1% from 2019.
- Biology: 35.4% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 11.4% from last year, but an increase of 10.4% from 2019.
- Computing: 39.2% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 13.4% from last year, but an increase of 20.5% from 2019.
- Design & Technology: 39.0% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 15.1% from last year, but an increase of 18.3 since 2019.
- ICT: 39.9% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease of 17.8% from last year, but an increase of 18.5% from 2019.
- Other Sciences: 33.6% of girls were awarded A or A*, a decrease 10.0% from last year, but an increase of 14.2% from 2019.
There was a year-on-year growth in entrant numbers of girls sitting Further Maths, Biology, Computing and Other Sciences A-Levels while all the other subjects saw a reduction in numbers.
Computing
The number of girls taking Computing A-Level increased slightly on 2021 (2.8%) and considerably on 2019 (59%). As a percentage of all entrants, girls made up 14.9% in 2022, compared with 14.6% in 2021 and 13.2% in 2019. The numbers are still quite low though, at 2352 versus 2031 in 2021, and 1475 in 2019. The increase is to be celebrated and is up from a very low base of 245 in 2013.
Design and Tech
There was a very respectable growth in the number of girls sitting Design and Technology A-Level this year, at 3394 compared with 3026, a 12.2% increase (however this was actually down 1.7% on 2019). Again the numbers are low compared with levels seen between 2013 and 2018 when there were around 5,000 entrants on average. The number of girls sitting the A-Level as a total of the percentage was 29.7% this year compared with 30.3% last year and 31.7% in 2019.
Maths
More girls sit maths A-Level than any other STEM subject, there were a considerable 36,086 this year. It is also the most popular STEM subject for boys – 56,290 sat this exam this year. Girls made up 37.7% of the total entrants this year compared with 38.9% last year, and 36.3% in 2019. So the number is actually up on the last time exams were taken for this subject. There was a 5.1% increase in the number of female candidates taking maths year on year (36,083 compared with 38,016, and an increase of 1.34% between 2019 and 2022.