Participation insights data
This data reports on student participation in HSC courses in 2025. View the number of students by learning area and other course category.
About the data
Students have many options when choosing the types of HSC courses they want to study. These courses cater to different interests, future goals, and pathways towards university, employment or further study. The main types of courses include:
- Board Developed courses
- General education
- Languages
- Life skills courses
- VET Industry Curriculum Frameworks
- Content Endorsed courses
- Board Endorsed courses
- School Developed
- University Developed
- VET
This section shows a breakdown of students by learning area and other course categories.
This data is taken from 19 January 2026.
Participation by learning area
View the total number of students by key learning area for 2025.
| Learning Area | Number of students | % of HSC cohort |
|---|---|---|
| English | 72,975 | 100% |
| Mathematics | 61,504 | 84% |
| Science | 34,291 | 47% |
| Human Society and its Environment | 53,703 | 74% |
| Languages | 5,210 | 7% |
| Technological and Applied Studies | 21,865 | 30% |
| Creative Arts | 18,206 | 25% |
| PDHPE | 29,229 | 40% |
| VET | 20,173 | 28% |
Participation by other course category
View the total number of students in other course categories for 2025.
| Category | Number of students | % of HSC cohort |
|---|---|---|
| Life Skills | 2,187 | 3% |
| Board Endorsed Course | 12,154 | 17% |
| Course with Practical or Performance exams | 27,931 | 38% |
Number of units by learning area
View the number of students completing each learning area, broken down by the number of units studied for 2025.
Optional exams have been excluded.
| Learning Area | 1 unit | 2 units | 3 units | 4 units | 5 units | 6 units | 7+ units |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| English | 0 | 69,289 | 2,263 | 1,423 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Mathematics | 0 | 52,291 | 5,370 | 3,841 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
| Science | 0 | 23,093 | 352 | 9,370 | 446 | 969 | 61 |
| Human Society and its Environment | 5,036 | 22,318 | 5,247 | 13,107 | 2,743 | 3,911 | 1,341 |
| Languages | 0 | 4,343 | 627 | 184 | 38 | 17 | 1 |
| Technological and Applied Studies | 22 | 18,665 | 9 | 2,936 | 0 | 230 | 3 |
| Creative Arts | 83 | 15,167 | 396 | 2,232 | 78 | 232 | 18 |
| PDHPE | 260 | 23,882 | 123 | 4,766 | 12 | 183 | 3 |
| VET | 8 | 12,828 | 1,202 | 4,080 | 557 | 969 | 529 |