NEW DELHI: Science and Arts have been students' most preferred choice of subject after Class 10 in the past ten years.
Students opting for Science and Arts streams have increased from 31% in 2012 to above 40% in 2022. While the Commerce stream lagged far behind, with only 14 per cent of students opting for the once most sought-after subject.
While 30.9 lakh students opted for the Arts stream in 2012, it went up to 40 lakh in 2022. The Science stream was chosen by 30.7 lakh students in 2012; it went up to 42 lakh in 2022.
Commerce was chosen by 13.7 lakh students in 2012 and 14.4 lakh students chose the stream in 2022.
Also, what is interesting is that takers for the Science stream were more in south India than in the rest of the country. At the same time, only 2 % of students studied Arts in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana as compared to Tripura (85%), Gujarat (82%), other northern states like Punjab (73%), Rajasthan (71%).
In the same way, the Science stream saw little interest in northern and northeast states like Punjab (13%), Haryana (15%), and Assam (17%) as compared to Andhra Pradesh (76%), Telangana (65%), Tamil Nadu (62%).
The report showed that most students who opted for the Commerce stream were from Karnataka (37 per cent).
"Selection of the particular stream may be due to local literacy rate, parents' educational background, job availability, student movement to foreign universities etc," an education ministry official told the TNIE.
Before 2010 separate streamwise data was not collected. It was in 2012 onwards that the pass percentage was collected, the official said.
The report added that students' choice for vocational courses is also increasing; a commensurate increase in seats at higher education levels may be required.
Other key findings