The government has plans to increase the number of girls taking maths at A-level in a bid to encourage more girls into careers in artificial intelligence (AI).
The Department for Education (DfE) is investing £8.3m, as part of the government’s Advanced Maths Support Programme, in offering support to 400 disadvantaged secondary schools in England in the hopes of getting thousands of girls into advanced maths classes.
Education secretary Bridget Phillipson explained this investment in underprivileged areas aims to close the “barriers to opportunity” for certain pupils who may otherwise not consider a maths qualification or AI career: “Today’s brightest maths minds are tomorrow’s AI pioneers, and this government is opening the door for groups who have so far been left behind in the AI revolution.”
Unfortunately, a child’s socio-economic background can stand between them and certain educational pathways, and digital exclusion across the UK means approximately 1.7 million households in the UK have no internet access, further exacerbating the UK technology sector’s diversity gap.
This only serves to cause problems in the future – with AI already in danger of being built with inherent bias, there are concerns that if the teams developing AI technologies are not diverse, the probability of systems being created with bias will only increase.
As highlighted by the DfE, only a third of the pupils who currently take maths at A-Level are girls, and women only make up around 22% of those working in AI or related careers.
The DfE’s new investment is part of the government’s Plan for Change laid out in December of 2024, part of which aims to level the playing field when it comes to education across the country to make sure children are given equal access to education regardless of their socio-economic background or where in England they are from.
The government is particularly focused on this due to its AI opportunities action plan, which lays out how it plans to increase AI adoption, create AI jobs and bolster the UK’s economic growth.
Ensuring more girls are able to gain support to study maths at an advanced level, including skills needed for a career in AI in the future, tackles both the government’s plans for providing equal access to education and for developing the skills the UK will need for future careers.
Girls are often deterred from tech careers, partly because they feel the subjects they would need to study for a technology career in the future are “too hard”, though some admit to going on to regret the decision not to take these subjects.
Starting in September, the recently updated Advanced Maths Support Programme will feature both teacher and student training surrounding the maths skills needed for an AI career, to ensure teachers are capable of delivering these skills, and girls are aware of what is involved in an AI-led future.
To further develop the education system to reflect the ongoing need for digital and AI skills, the education secretary has implemented a group of experts to advise on how best to achieve this goal for students between the ages of five and 18.
The plan to get more girls into AI careers via accessible maths education was one of the recommendations already made by the Digital, AI and Technology Task and Finish Group, made up of experts from organisations such as University College London, the Raspberry Pi Computing Education Research Centre at the University of Cambridge, and the BCS Schools and Colleges Committee.
Science secretary Peter Kyle said of the plan: “AI is the defining technology of our generation, improving our public services, sparking fresh economic growth, and unlocking the jobs of the future. We can only harness that potential if we have a pipeline of talent equipped with the skills they need for the jobs of tomorrow.
“This package of support will help us deliver our Plan for Change and do exactly that. This is the first step in our plan to give every young person in the country the opportunity to develop the tools which will put them front and centre in delivering our AI-powered future.”
