Provisional Entries for Summer 2024: GCSEs, AS, A levels and Skills Challenge Certificate
An annual report which presents provisional data on Entries for Summer 2024 GCSEs, AS, A levels and Skills Challenge Certificate for Wales.
Key Points
In 2020 and 2021, summer exams were cancelled due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and grades were determined by centres. Entry figures in this release will have been affected by different approaches to awarding grades, as well as by other disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Further information can be found in the background notes.
GCSEs
- 322,655 GCSE entries were made for summer 2024. This is up by 4.8% compared to GCSE entries for summer 2023.
- When compared to 2019, the number of entries in 2024 increased by 5.5%.
- Year 11 learners are the most likely to enter for GCSEs in the summer series, accounting for 90.0% of total entries.
- The number of Year 11 entries decreased by 5.3% this summer compared to summer 2023.
- Year 10 entries made up 5.7% of all GCSE entries this summer. There were 18,395 entries from Year 10 learners in summer 2024. This is a decrease of 7.2% compared to last summer, when there were 19,825.
- Year 12 or above entries increased this summer, making up 4.1% of total GCSE entries compared to 3.9% last summer.
AS level
- There were 42,630 AS level entries in summer 2024 in Wales, 1.3% more than in summer 2023 and 2.4% more than in 2019.
- There were 35,855 entries from Year 12 learners, accounting for 84.1% of all entries compared to 86.2% in summer 2023, and 76.5% in summer 2019.
- The number of Year 13 entries increased by 17.5% this summer compared to 2023 and decreased by 31.8% this summer compared to summer 2019.
A level
- There were 32,385 A level entries for summer 2024, 2.3% fewer than in summer 2023.
- There was a decrease of 4.3% in entries for Year 13 learners, however Year 13 learners still accounted for 90.2% of all A level entries this summer compared to 92.2% for summer 2023.
- Year 14 and above entries have increased by 25.0% between summer 2024 and summer 2023 but have decreased by 32.2% compared to summer 2019.
- When compared to 2019, entries have decreased by 0.6%. This was driven by a decrease in Year 14 and Year 11 and below, entries of 32.2% and 64.0% respectively.
There are a number of factors that can influence why entries for year groups might change over time, for example changes to:
- Population size;
- Entry behavior e.g. when learners are entered for their GCSEs;
- The number of qualifications of each type being taken on average;
- The types of qualifications being taken in post-16.
As this release is based on counts of entries at qualification level it is not possible for us to quantify the impact of such factors. We have commented on factors influencing changes in entries only where we are confident that these factors are likely to be associated with a change.
Contact
Statistician
Tel: 01633 373 250
Email: statistics@qualifications.wales
Press
Tel: 01633 373 222
Email: media@qualifications.wales