Where have all the GCSE Business Studies students gone in recent years? The bottom line is that many have been switched to non-examined BTEC courses, as this little piece of analysis indicates…

I’ve delved into the latest BTEC results published by Edexcel which report on the calendar year results gained at Level 2 and Level 3 from 1 June 2010 to 31 May 2011 for all BTEC courses. I’ve separated the BTEC Business courses and summarised the volume of learners being awarded qualifications into the following table:

btec-business-2011.xls

134,000 students getting Level 2 awards in BTEC business in 2010/11; the vast majority in schools rather than FE Colleges. Thats a significant number - no wonder that GCSE Business enrolment has fallen so much in recent years.