Higher-level divide between genders
September 14, 2012
Girls are more likely to take higher-level Irish and maths and continue to get better grades in most Junior Certificate subjects.
With much made of the improved uptake in honours maths in last month’s Leaving Certificate results and again in this week’s Junior Cert results, today’s statistics from the State Examinations Commission show there is still a big gender gap.
The results of girls are consistently better than boys at both State exams, in line with trends internationally, although there is evidence that males are making up the difference each year.
Slightly fewer than half of the 28,545 females who took Junior Cert Irish exams in June opted for the higher-level papers.
This is significantly higher than the 46.5% of more than 29,500 boys who sat maths, while a bigger proportion of boys chose the foundation-level exam.
The overall numbers who sat higher-level maths were up almost 2,500 on last year to nearly 28,000.
More boys than girls still took higher-level Leaving Cert maths this year — 23% compared to 21% — although the rise in female honours students was more significant.
A doubling of marks for the optional oral Irish test to 40% has been flagged as a factor in rising numbers sitting the subject at higher level for Junior Cert. The gender divide in this regard is even wider than at maths, with 59% of girls and just 44% of boys taking higher-level Irish.
Almost 86% of girls taking higher Irish got an honours grade (A, B, or C) but just 73% of males did so, while females outperformed males for honours at higher maths — 81.3% compared to 77.2%.
IRISH EXAMINER
