After the final summer 2023 maths GCSE exam, CENTURY’s Chief Education Officer and former maths teacher, Tom Thacker, reflects on solutions for the Prime Minister’s plan for compulsory maths to 18.In recent weeks, the final maths GCSEs of the summer have been taken. Many 16 year olds up and down the country threw their pens down and said goodbye to their least favourite subject. They left the exam halls excited for a summer of freedom before the step up to post-16 education where, currently, they are allowed autonomy over their subject choices (if they “pass”). Though this may not be the case for long.Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s plan to make maths compulsory to the age of 18 has been met with mixed feelings. Happy Valley star James Norton, raised concerns that compulsory maths to 18 would have a damaging effect on the take up of arts and humanities subjects. Stephen Follows, a film data analyst, described the policy as both “misguided” and “tone deaf”, before adding that he had not even been asked if he supported the policy before being appointed one of the government’s “maths champions”.Will Maths to 18 disengage students?I disagree that this will damage the arts or disengage students (caveat: if it is implemented well). The government is not legislating, as Norton and many others have assumed, for all pupils to take maths A Level. That could indeed have a negative impact on the take-up rate of other A Levels, as well as a huge increase in the failure rate. In 2022, around 276,000 students took A Levels. About 89,000 students took maths A Level, making it the most popular subject by some distance, almost 15,000 more than the second-most popular (psychology). Around 187,000 A Level students took no maths at all. If each of those students had to take maths as one of their three A Levels instead of their preferred choice, that would mean 187,000 fewer A Levels taken in other subjects. But this policy is for those students to do some maths as well as their three A Levels.Follows argued that by “imposing a blanket requirement that many will resent”, the government “risks stifling the passions and interests of individual students”. However, in education we must have some blanket requirements. Few people argue against our blanket requirement for compulsory maths to age 16. Many other countries with high quality education systems have compulsory maths until 18, including Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Finland, Japan, Norway and the USA. It should be possible to find the time to sharpen everyone’s maths without entirely demoralising them.Broader Curriculum from 16 to 19There has been a building case for a broader curriculum from 16 to 19, too. Last year the Times Education Commission recommended a baccalaureate with a mixture of humanities and STEM subjects – including maths and English. I agree with Follows that the education system “should focus on helping students discover who they are and then provide the necessary support and resources for them to become the best version of that person”. And maths can be part of this. As a former maths teacher, I am naturally, and rationally, biased, but for balance, I also believe English – or at the very least a humanities subject involving analysis and essay-writing – should be compulsory to 18 too.It also goes without saying for those of us who know the FE sector well, but there are a lot more than 89,000 A Level students who already do compulsory maths after 16. These are the students who do not achieve at least a grade 4 in their GCSE. In 2022 there were over 250,000 of these students in England. If roughly a third of students have to continue because they have “failed”, and roughly an eighth of students opt for maths A Level anyway, that leaves us with just over half who do not continue with maths (thirteen twenty-fourths in actuality, but that fraction is unwieldy).This policy is aimed at just over half of the student cohort who achieved between a grade 4 and a 9 in their maths GCSE...

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