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A better set of indicators than year 12 science commencement statistics are year 12 science

completions. Previous editions of the Statistical Overview included completion statistics compiled by the Group of 8 Universities Secretariat11. These statistics were sourced from State and Territory

assessment, curriculum or accreditation authorities and reconciled the different nomenclatures used throughout the country using a similar structure to Barrington’s approach in mathematics. The Group of 8

9

Ainley J, Kos J and Nicholas, M, Participation in sciences, mathematics and technology in Australian education, ACER Research Monograph 63, 2009

10

Australian Academy of Science, The status and Quality of Year 11 and 12 Science in Australian Schools, 2012, http://science.org.au/publications/research-reports-and-policy.html

11

Group of 8, National Trends in Year 12 Course Completions, Policy Note Number 6, April 2012, www.go8.edu.au

0.0 5.0 10.0 15.0 20.0 25.0 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 % of T ot a l Cour s e Com pl e ti ons

Figure 4.4: Year 12 Course Completions by Subject

English Maths Science

Society & Environment Technology Arts

Secretariat kindly made these statistics available to Engineers Australia12, but the labour intensity of this work has meant that the statistics have not been updated. The remainder of the material in this section is unchanged from last year.

The statistics compiled were subject and overall completions, rather than unit records for individual students and can be applied in several ways; to examine the status of mathematics and science studies; to examine the gender balance in subjects and to examine trends in absolute numbers of course

completions.

In 2005, there were 194,165 year 12 students who completed 954,937 courses, an average of 4.9 courses per student. By 2010, student numbers had increased 10.5% to 214,542, but course

completions only increased by 2.8% because the average number of course completed per student fell

12

I would like to express my thanks to Mike Gallagher and Mike Teese from the Go8 for making the statistics available to Engineers Australia. 0 5000 10000 15000 20000 25000 30000 35000 40000 45000 50000 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 Num be r of Com pl e ti ons

Figure 4.5: Trends in the Completion of Year 12 Mathematics Courses

Boys Advanced Girls Advanced Boys Intermediate Girls Intermediate Boys Fundamental Girls Fundamental

0 5,000 10,000 15,000 20,000 25,000 30,000 35,000 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 No of Cour s e Com pl e ti ons

Figure 4.6: Trends in the Completion of Year 12 Science Courses

to 4.6. The important issue for tertiary engineering courses is flow of year 12 students completing mathematics and science courses and the level of mathematics and the nature of science courses. On average, each year 12 student completed between 4.9 and 4.6 courses, or about 5 courses. In other words, a subject with about twenty percent of completions is studied by almost all students. Figure 4.4 shows that both mathematics and English are in this category and the trends in both subjects were stable over the six years examined. However, in science the proportion of course completions drops to about 14.5%, suggesting that about two-thirds of year 12 students complete a science course.

Figure 4.5 looks at mathematics completions more closely; it shows the trends in the numbers of boys and girls completing advanced, intermediate and fundamental mathematics courses. The illustration shows actual numbers of completions rather than the proportion illustrated in Figure 4.1 above. Figure 4.4 shows that completions of mathematics courses have increased for both genders; by 6.6% for boys and by 5.0% for girls. The number of advanced mathematics course completions has increased for both boys and girls; by 56.7% for boys and by 67.1% for girls. But the number of completions by girls is considerably and consistently lower than for boys. In 2010, 23,484 advanced mathematics courses were completed by boys and 15,553 were completed by girls. These trends are consistent with observations from Barrington’s statistics, there is a downwards trend in the proportion of year 12 students with advanced mathematics, but actual numbers are increasing.

The number of intermediate mathematics course completions has fallen for both boys and girls; by 15.3% for boys and by 13.8% for girls. This result is different to observations from Barrington’s statistics which showed a small increase in numbers, but this difference may just be due to commencements not translating into completions. Fewer girls than boys complete intermediate mathematics courses. In 2010, 38,704 intermediate mathematics courses were completed by boys and 36,261 by girls.

The number of fundamental mathematics course completions has increased for both boys and girls; by 13.1% for boys and by 9.8% for girls. The gender composition is opposite that for completion of

advanced and intermediate mathematics courses with more girls than boys’ completing mathematics at this level.

Figures 4.2 and 4.3 showed that proportionally year 12 science commencements have been decreasing. Figure 4.6 shows that completion of science courses have been stable at about 14.5% of total

completions. It is the composition of science completions and its gender balance that is the limiting factor for the flow of year 12 students to tertiary engineering courses. Biology accounts for about one third of year 12 science completions (the red line in Figure 4.6). Completions by girls outnumber completions by boys by two to one; in 2010, there were 30,555 completions by girls compared to 16,747 by boys. Chemistry accounts for about one quarter of year 12 science completions (the brown and yellow lines in Figure 4.6). Although completions by boys were higher, there was not much gender difference. In 2010, there were 17,253 completions by boys and 16,363 completions by girls.

About one fifth of year 12 science completions were physics courses and here there was a different gender balance to that observed for biology. Completions by boys outnumber completions by girls by almost three to one. There was a slowly increasing trend in completions by boys, but at best, a static or slowly falling trend for girls. In 2010, 17,253 boys completed year 12 physics courses and only 6,977 girls.

These statistics confirm the widespread perception that far too few high school students are completing mathematics and science courses needed for tertiary studies in engineering. The importance of higher participation to year 12 is that actual numbers completing these courses have stopped falling and in some cases there are small increases. However, at some point participation will stabilise and the

continuing problem that the proportion of year 12 students studying these courses is falling, will remerge. Gender balance is another issue that needs to be addressed as this could become a limiting factor to increasing the number of women engineers.