The pipeline of women founders does not spring a leak in the boardroom, or even at university. It starts much earlier, at 16, on an A-level options form. The latest UK data on girls’ A-level choices shows girls taking just over half of all A-levels, yet remaining scarce in the small cluster of subjects, computing, physics, further maths and economics, that most often lead to founding and scaling businesses. This is not an ability gap. It is a gap in access, confidence and information, and all three are fixable.
What the 2024 A-level data shows
A-level outcomes in England have been broadly stable in recent years, with small shifts in subject uptake. Most 18-year-olds take three A-levels, and only a small minority take four. Mathematics remains the most popular A-level subject: UK entries passed 100,000 for the first time in 2024. Psychology, biology, chemistry and economics also rank among the most-entered subjects.
The gender split is where the real story lies. Girls account for just over half of all A-level entries, yet in 2024 they made up only around 37% of maths entries and roughly three in ten economics entries. In physics, fewer than one in four entries were female; in computing, fewer than one in five.
The Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET) puts a number on the overall divide: core STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) subjects accounted for close to half of boys’ A-level entries, but only around a third of girls’ entries.
Where girls are choosing, and where they are not
Strong gains in the life sciences
Biology remains female-dominated, with girls accounting for around two thirds of entries, and roughly three quarters of psychology entries are female. Chemistry is now close to balanced, at just over half female. Recent results days have also brought modest year-on-year increases in girls’ entries to biology, chemistry, maths and physics.
Persistent gaps in the subjects that feed tech and finance
Computing and physics remain heavily male, and economics, despite growing interest from girls, still sits at around three in ten female entries. These are precisely the subjects that feed the software, data, engineering and finance sectors, where a large share of high-growth founders emerge.
Non-STEM subjects: wide choices, some warning signs
Girls continue to choose widely across humanities, languages and arts. In 2024, English, sociology, art and design, drama and psychology all drew female shares of roughly three quarters or more, while history and geography were more balanced. Entries in some modern foreign languages, drama and arts subjects have declined over the past decade for both sexes.
Why this is a founder issue, not just an education story
Subject choice quietly opens and closes degree routes
Many STEM and economics degrees expect specific A-levels, and maths, further maths, physics and computing are the subjects most often required or strongly preferred on quantitative courses. Tools such as the Russell Group’s Informed Choices guidance show exactly which combinations keep which degrees open. A girl who drops maths at 16 may not feel the consequences for years, until a degree in computer science, engineering or economics, and the founder paths that grow out of them, is no longer on the table.
Skills: an access gap, not an ability gap
Founders draw on a mix of analytical, quantitative, creative and communication skills. Girls’ strong representation in psychology, biology and the arts builds real capability in understanding people, which matters enormously in business. But low participation in computing and maths means less early exposure to programming and data analysis, skills now embedded in almost every growing sector. Women who found businesses without that grounding do acquire it later, but they pay for the catch-up in time, money and confidence. It is worth being blunt: nothing in the data suggests girls cannot do these subjects. They are simply not being routed into them.
Confidence, norms and role models
Research from the Girls’ Schools Association suggests that pupils in girls’ schools are more likely to choose physics, further maths and economics than girls in mixed schools, which points to stereotype pressure rather than preference. When girls cannot see women running technology or engineering businesses, those subjects read as “not for me”.
Zoom out, and the stakes are clear. Only around one in three UK entrepreneurs is a woman, and the government’s 2019 Rose Review of female entrepreneurship estimated that if women started and scaled businesses at the same rate as men, it could add up to £250 billion to the UK economy. The subject choices being made this year will help decide whether that gap narrows or hardens. The Prowess facts and statistics on women in business track the current picture in detail.
What actually moves the numbers
For parents and students
Talk about industries and problems to solve, not just grades. A practical rule of thumb: keep at least one widely valued door-opener subject in the mix, maths, economics, computing or a science, and pair it with a strength in humanities or the arts. That combination keeps business, technology and social science degrees open without closing creative routes. If A-level maths feels like a step too far, the Core Maths qualification keeps quantitative skills alive alongside three other subjects. Before finalising choices, check degree requirements on Informed Choices. And if the school does not offer further maths, ask about support through the government-funded Advanced Mathematics Support Programme; provision varies far more between schools than most parents realise.
For schools and educators
The strongest levers are early and specific: positive messaging about maths and science at GCSE, before options are fixed; honest guidance that two or more STEM subjects keep the widest range of degrees and founder routes open; and visible female role models, because founder visits, mentoring programmes and alumnae networks genuinely shift what girls see as possible. Where computing and further maths are missing from the timetable, that is the first gap to close.
For business owners
If you run a business, you are part of the fix. Offering a work-experience placement, giving a careers talk or mentoring through organisations such as Stemettes or Tech She Can puts a real woman founder in front of girls at the exact moment they are choosing. It costs very little, and role-model contact is among the better-evidenced interventions in this space: girls who meet women doing these jobs are measurably more likely to pick the subjects that lead to them.
For policy-makers and funders
Careers guidance should be current and consistent in every school, not only selective ones. Funding STEM enrichment in disadvantaged areas and mixed schools, and supporting far wider availability of further maths and computing, would widen female access where the gaps are largest. Support for families and communities to challenge gendered norms matters too.
Looking ahead
The trends are moving in the right direction, but slowly. Girls’ entries to core STEM subjects have risen modestly in recent years, led by biology and chemistry, while computing has barely shifted. Subject choices act as filters for everything that follows: degrees, sectors and, ultimately, who founds businesses. If the options forms being signed today still steer girls away from computing, physics and economics, the founder pipeline of the 2030s and 2040s will look much like today’s. The encouraging part is that none of the fixes are mysterious. They are specific, local and already working in pockets. The question is whether they become the norm.
Further reading: meet the inspirational female entrepreneurs who paved the way, and explore what 2026’s data shows about women in UK AI leadership.
