Girls outclass boys at IT GCSEs

In IT, girls are scoring better grades than boys at GCSE and A-level, but they are still in the minority

Girls outperformed boys in their IT GCSEs this year, but despite their success many more boys took the subject. However, the figures indicate the advantages of getting more females involved in the IT industry to expand the pool of talent.

Almost 61,000 boys and under 49,000 girls sat an ICT GCSE exam this summer. On average, girls performed better, with 23 percent scoring an A or A* grade, a feat achieved by only 17 percent of boys.

Ailsa Symeonides of IT service management specialist Axios Systems, and founder of the Axios A Star Awards for female computing students, said it was encouraging that girls scored high grades, but the difference in numbers of girls and boys taking IT exams was disappointing.

“The ICT industry needs to get rid of the ‘male only’ reputation and seek to encourage and promote more girls into the sector,” Symeonides argued. “Some of the biggest ICT companies are run by women and the opportunities are there for girls to be very successful.”

The gap between male and female students is also mirrored at A-level. This year, only 600 females sat a computing A-level exam, compared with 5,600 males. However, two-thirds of the females achieved an A to C grade, compared with 57 percent of male students.

The pattern was similar for the ICT A-level, which was sat by 9,000 males and only 5,100 females this summer. But again, females outperformed their male counterparts, with 58 percent scoring an A to C grade, while only 46 percent of males achieved these scores.