Quarter of adults do not have GCSE maths and English
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/05/25/maths-english-gcse-qualifications-exams-tuc/
Posted by Alarming-Safety3200
Quarter of adults do not have GCSE maths and English
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2026/05/25/maths-english-gcse-qualifications-exams-tuc/
Posted by Alarming-Safety3200
37 Comments
The irony being, of course, is that the article has a spelling error in it. Amusing.
Were they talking their exams before GCSEs? And have the equivalent?
People will talk about individual anecdotes when it comes to statistics like this.
But as a population average people without GCSEs have far worse outcomes and don’t have the same access to some entry-level jobs and further education.
It’s not a positive thing to have such a large number of people without basic qualifications.
Makes it very difficult these days to get into even practical training courses. You can do maths and English qualifications alongside your training, but you have more choice of courses if you have your GCSE.
Pass marks for GCSEs are somewhat relative to how everyone else does so it’s literally impossible for everyone to get a GCSE in English and Maths.
Adult education isn’t well funded either so if you decide at e.g. 25 you want to rectify your lack of gcse qualifications it’s not exactly easy.
I don’t have any GCSEs or A Levels but I do have a MEng which seems to make up for it. I haven’t been asked about my GCSEs since I was maybe 18 and I’m 28 now, but then until I started my degree I did just lie on all my job applications that I had them anyway and luckily got away with it.
Misleading headline: a quarter of adults don’t have GCSE maths and English **at grade 4/C or above**
Way people vote depending on education is also interesting comparison.
I got a D in maths, does that count as having a GCSE?
“More than a quarter of adults in England do not have GCSE qualifications in English and maths, a new study has revealed.” Meanwhile, all foreign immigrants entering the UK post-Brexit must have at least B1 (GCSE) or B2 English proficiency, which means that ALL recent immigrants speak better English than 25% of adults in England. That’s a problem for all.
Im 50. I have a master degree. But best i managed was a D in english after 3 attempts. I think this was something to do with my dyslexia/neurodiverity where I just couldn’t get how to do the reading between the lines to find hidden meaning to write about.
Honestly I think a lot of parents try to put their kids off education ‘oh what do they know?’ ‘hows that going to help you in the real world?’ ‘well I didn’t need GCSE’s so it doesn’t matter anyway’ ‘I didn’t go to university, too many people go to university’ I don’t get it.
Education is so so so important and it’s a vital building block that sets you up for life and opens so many more doors.
It also kind of feels like governments have wanted to suppress education in the UK when the country as a whole needs to promote it.
Back in 2003 in my first year of secondary school my maths teacher had a heart attack in class and for the rest of my school experience I had substitute teachers. I got an E. I’m still sore about it now as I didn’t have a chance with such an unruly classroom. I was written off and the teachers didn’t give a shit. In my mid 20’s I found out I had Autism and I really wish it was picked up earlier.
I failed my maths O level ( older here)
Crap teaching – but got top passes in everything else .
Still able to go to University and work in education without it
Luckily for me they brought in the maths requirement -years after I graduated .
But I do still feel awkward about not having a maths qualification even tho I’m now retired! . Thankfully my kids did well in maths – hubbys genes I’m sure!
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I can’t believe 20% of adults don’t have a GCSE in maths?!
‘Aw you don’t need maths or any of that, I left school without any of that and I turned out fine ‘ – Jane who probably doesn’t understand why 20% is the same as 1/5
It would be nice for government support to have adults retaking their GCSE maths and English. Mine cost me £60 for Maths to retake but my college has now doubled this to £120 and removed free transportation for low income earners. This puts people off from retaking GCSE.
I have an E in GCSE maths. But I also have a degree so like… does it matter?
The amount of senior managers I have worked with who do not grasp percentages or statistics in general is eye-opening.
But the worst people I have ever worked with are highly educated and qualified – Chemistry graduates in my case. Absolutely zero common sense and think their qualifications entitle them to special treatment. No concept of pragmatism or how the world actually works.
It’s more my personal experience, I would have preferred an English GSCE that was more about preparing me for work. I was never into creative writing, analysis or anything else.
Is this adjusted for people who were at school before they existed, and people who went though different education systems?
Yeah this is why democracy is a problem and will erode completely until it unravels to the degree we put a new system in place “after”
In our latest episode of “How is this Telegraph headline lying?” – the stats are for adults who got *level two* qualifications (C or above, or the new equivalent of grade 4 or above) in GCSE English and Maths.
If you got a D in GCSE English, that’s a level one qualification. It’s still a pass and you still have an English GCSE.
Tune in for another episode of “How is this Telegraph headline lying?”… next time the Telegraph publishes an article!
Current opinion polls for Reform are 27%.
Or just over a quarter of voting adults, if you will.
I did gcse English twice, at school it was all about league tables, I remember working my backside off and being disappointed with a D.
At college it was literally a formula to pass, you turned up, did as you were told and would get the grade c that your course required. I remember wondering how Bryan, our tutor, could be so certain. But he was right, we all got what we needed and it was a totally different syllabus than we had done at our respective schools, with a totally different exam board. Whatever cost us marks he must have been able to iron out, and while having to do the resit confused me at first, it was something that helped me as I wasn’t defeated by the subject
I don’t have any GCSEs, but then I didn’t go to school in England.
It’s really quite rare for statistics in newspapers to mean what they want you to think they mean, isn’t it?
I grew up working class in the North West and worked hard in school etc, did well enough in exams and at 30 I’m now earning 75k in the West Mids. My wealthiest mates from back home are tradies who did shite in school but had a good head on their shoulders and started up their own businesses.
I always think it comes down to the individual though, I had some mates from really rough families that wanted to break the cycle and did so through education and I had some mates with the loveliest parents that wanted to play gangster and are now suffering for it.
Remind me again what Reforms national vote share was 2 weeks ago
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You would read this and think getting a job would be so easy
25% of the competition is dire
Only 75% left to worry about and probably lots of hacks and idiots in that pot too
The standard is so low as well. A slightly above-average 11-year-old could probably get close with just brief exposure to the content.
This is pretty much BS and shows ignorance (wilful or otherwise) of how exams work.
Firstly the articles define a “pass” as being grade 4 (or grade C in old money). This is wrong as a grade 1 or grade G. A 4 or C is regarded as a ”good” grade and is usually the minimum requirement for courses, jobs (which is fair enough)
More relevantly it is impossible for an entire cohort to achieve a grade 4 (C) or better – exams aren’t designed that way. They are designed to rank students each year as part of the progression to the next stage of education and/or training.
For a variety of reasons the maximum number of students who can achieve a grade 4 or bettereach year is around 67/68% (The Covid years were different of course.)
So each year – by design – around 32% won’t get a grade 4 no matter how well they do.
So in actual fact 25% fact not getting a 4 in either English AND Maths is actually a good thing if you think it through.
Well the system is setup so that ~30% of pupils fail each GCSE subject so this is not a big surprise.
So I recently went back to college with an attempt to get a Maths Functional Skill Level 1 qualification. I was looking forward to the experience over the months ahead, but the course eventually it quickly took a downward spiral with the teacher getting frustrated at a few people in class who were unable to do certain parts of maths. Then the teacher was telling us the course might suddenly close at any time because of not enough numbers on the course as they needed a minimum of 12 and only 7 were registered.
Also another problem was if you don’t understand something in maths you can suddenly find yourself very quickly falling behind and unable to catch up while the teacher continues to progress through the curriculum with little regard of the strugglers.
I came to maths lacking certain knowledge so attempted to make a few educational guesses only to be patronised and knock back for an attempting answering a question, which make me think “why should I bother continuing?”. I have dropped out the course now and shall progress by myself using YouTube videos, but my concerns are if maths isn’t taught very well, then it’s not surprising people will come away with no qualifications in the subject.
Took me three attempts to get to a C in maths. E, D and finally C. Parents had to employ a private tutor for me, teaching is abysmal in the U.K.
You do know that the system is literally made so that a percentage get less than a grade 4/C every year. This statistic is not news to anyone who works within the system.