The Good News about Year 12 Science Enrolments in
Victoria
Dan O’Keeffe, Head of Science
Camberwell Grammar School
Students are taking Sciences in greater
proportions than ever before. This trend began
in the mid 1980s, accelerated in the early 1990s
and has generally stabilised in recent years. The
challenge for science teachers now is to use
current initiatives in science education to ensure
that these increases are built on in the next
millenium.
physical sciences, in the same proportion as the
existing students.
The article by John Werry, ‘Where are the Year
12 science students going? A discussion paper’,
in the June 1998 Labtalk raised a number of
issues about VCE Science enrolments. Unlike
many commentators in the media and
elsewhere, John realised that, as a measure of
the popularity of a subject, raw student
enrolment data can be misleading due to other
social factors.
Such a measure is to take the comparison of the
enrolment data back to a year when all the
students were at school – their first year of
secondary school.
To get a better picture, he analysed the
enrolment data as a percentage of the Year 12
English enrolment. This statistical measure
eliminates the effect of a varying birth rate. For
example, if there are more babies born in any
particular year, then you would expect the
population for any subject to increase when
these babies ‘mature’ into Year 12 students.
However, this measure can be affected by the
retention rate, which is the percentage of Year 7
students who stay on to Year 12. Not all the
students who enter secondary school in Year 7
continue on to Year 12. Many leave after Year
10, for example.
If there is an increase in the retention rate, then
many of the students who had previously left
school at Year 10 or Year 11, stay on to Year
12, increasing the number of students doing
Year 12 English.
It is not likely that these additional Year 12
students will take up subjects, such as the
Any variation in the retention rate will therefore
affect interpretation of the graphs that John
used. A better measure is needed, one that
overcomes variations in both the birth and
retention rates.
The apparent retention rate for a subject is
defined as “The Percentage of Year 7 students
who study a particular subject when they reach
Year 12 five years later”. It is a measure of the
popularity of the subject that will not be affected
by changes in the number of births or whether
more Year 10s stay on to Year 12. Any variation
in this value for a subject reflects the underlying
popularity of a subject, which of course can be
affected by a variety of social and educational
factors.
This measure reveals a different picture as a dip
in the birth rate passed through Year 12 a few
years ago, and the retention rate has gone
through some marked changes in the last fifteen
years.
The graphs below, Figures 1 - 4 show this
variation for male, female and total apparent
retention rate for Biology, Chemistry, Physics
and Psychology.
Biology
The graph shows a steady rise in the apparent
retention rate in early 70s, levelling off from the
late 70s until the late 80s with values of about
22%, 9% and 15% respectively for girls, boys
and the total population.
From 1989 until 1992, there was a steepening
increase, reaching a peak participation for all
students of 22.6%. This peak was followed by a
drop until 1994. Since then the graph has been
quite flat. It should be noted that the apparent
retention rate in each of the last ten years has
been better than any of the previous 17 years.

Chemistry
The distinctive feature of the Chemistry graphs
is the steady convergence of the male and
female graphs since 1972, with the Female
apparent retention rate being greater than the
Male Rate since 1992. There has been some
levelling off in the 90s after the peak of 1992.

Physics
There is a slight decline in the early 70s due to a
drop on the figures for male students, however
after that the graph is relatively flat until the mid
80s, when a steady rise begins for both male and
female students. This increase has a sudden
peak in 1992 and 1993, but the underlying
upward trend of the late 80s seems to have
continued through the mid 90s. In fact the
apparent retention rate for Physics in each of the
VCE years is better than any of the previous 20
years.
Psychology
Psychology was first offered in 1992. Since then
the subject has had a strong growth in
popularity, with some evidence of plateauing in
recent years.
Common Features
Overall, the distinctive feature common to the
first three graphs is a peak in 1992 coinciding
with the introduction of the VCE into Year 12.
The coincidence of the peak suggests a number
of possible explanations:
 Experienced teachers may recall there was
some initial confusion at the time as to the
breadth requirement for a student’s course
selection, with some students being told that
they had to takes a science subject as part of
their VCE. Within a couple of years, the
requirement was better understood as a
Science/Maths/Technology constraint.
When courses, such as Group 2 (HSC), T12,
STC, TOP, etc., were being abolished, the
students progressively moved across to the
HSC, which was to become the VCE in
1992. However, it is possible that once the
new VCE subjects became established in
schools, some chose them instead of
Biology, Chemistry and Biology.
Amazingly the equivalent graph for Physics
in NSW shows a similar peak. Perhaps there
was a national science news story at the time
the students were making their subject
selections!!
The exact cause or causes for the peak are
probably lost in time, nevertheless by 1994 it
could be said that previous trends had reestablished themselves.
Gender Comparison.
Biology
Biology has maintained a reasonably constant
proportional difference between female and
male students over the last twenty odd years.
Chemistry
As mentioned earlier there has been a steady
increase in the female apparent retention rate
during the 70s and 80s, and into the 90s, only
levelling off in 1993. The Male Apparent
Retention Rate in Chemistry has hardly changed
in recent decades. There have been more girls
than boys doing Chemistry since 1992.
Physics
It is interesting to note that for Physics, the male
and female graphs have more or less moved in
step. However the striking feature of the graphs
is that in the last 10 years there has been steady
growth in both male and female percentages at a
time when the equivalent data for Biology and
Chemistry has been relatively steady.
Significantly, the participation of boys
Physics is substantially greater than
participation of boys in Chemistry, while
difference for girls is even more marked in
opposite direction.
in
the
the
the
Psychology
As with Biology, Psychology has a strong
female cohort, and a similar participation from
boys.
Further Questions
These graphs raise further questions to
investigate:
 Why has the participation of girls in
Chemistry increased so steadily?
 Why do more boys do Physics than do
Chemistry?
Questions like these lead on to more specific
sub-questions, such as:
 What other subjects do girls who choose
Chemistry do? How are these different from
the other subjects of girls who choose
Physics? Similar questions can be asked
about boys in Physics and Chemistry.
 How many students only do one science
subject?
 What tertiary courses do each of these
groups select? How do their selections
differ?
 What are the prerequisites for the chosen
tertiary courses?
Information to assist in answering some of these
questions already exists.
As part of the recent VCE Review process,
VBOS analysed the 1997 Unit 3 enrolment data
for the overlap between science subjects for
both boys and girls in 1997, for example, how
many girls did both Unit 3 Biology and
Psychology in 1997.
Similarly, anonymous tertiary selection data
from previous years is available from VTAC to
researchers. The author has been able to analyse
the tertiary destination of all the VCE Physics
students for 1996 and 1997, sorted by TER
score, Study Score, Course Code, and Gender.
This has given an insight into how the tertiary
destination of physics students changes with
ability level, for example, how many choose a
Science degree and what is their TER range.
VBOS and VTAC would, I am sure, make their
data available to any keen researcher who would
like to investigate the participation of students
in secondary science and their tertiary
destinations. Further, Australian Bureau of
Statistics data is readily available to the public.
Where do we go from here?
This analysis, so far, has shown that the VCE
Sciences garden is quite healthy and has had
some recent rosy blooms, but further work
needs to be done, not only in tending the garden
beds, but identifying the factors that could
increase the abundance of blooms.
Happy gardening.
Sources of data:
Year 12 Subject Enrolment Data:
 Examiner’s Reports by VUSEB, VISE,
VCAB and VBOS
Year 7 Student numbers:
 Annual Secondary Education Reports by
Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)
Figures 1 - 4
Percentage of Year 7 students doing
Year 12 Biology five years later
35.0%
30.0%
25.0%
Female
20.0%
Male
15.0%
Total
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98
Percentage of Year 7 students doing
Year 12 Chemistry five years later
18.0%
16.0%
14.0%
12.0%
Female
10.0%
Male
8.0%
Total
6.0%
4.0%
2.0%
0.0%
72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98
Percentage of Year 7 students doing
Year 12 Physics five years later
25.0%
20.0%
Female
15.0%
Male
Total
10.0%
5.0%
0.0%
72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98
Percentage of Year 7 students doing
Year 12 Psychology five years later
40.0%
30.0%
Female
20.0%
Male
10.0%
Total
0.0%
1990 1992 1994 1996 1998 2000
Years