designated teacher advisers or teacher co-ordinators to work full-time in that area. Others had advisers, often women, who were asked to take responsibility for equal opportunities in addition to their subject responsibilities. 40. The three major centrally funded initiatives aimed at preparing schoolchildren for working life had emphasized the need to avoid sex stereotyping in courses and teaching materials. Equality of opportunity was integral to the Technical and Vocational Education Initiative (TVEI), which now extended to every education authority in the country and supported and supplemented the objectives of the national curriculum in making the curriculum for 14- to 18-year-olds more relevant to adult and working life. Government-funded programmes supporting the use of micro-computers in schools had also stressed the development of courses and teaching materials that avoided stereotyping, and the new City Technology Colleges were required to provide equal opportunities for boys and girls as a condition of funding, by selecting pupils in accordance with objective admissions criteria irrespective of their sex. As a result, more girls were expected to take up science, engineering and technological sxibjects and more parents to encourage their daughters to follow such careers. 41. Examination results showed that there had been some improvements in reducing sex stereotyping in schools and in girls' examination performance. Over the past 10 years, there had been a steady growth in the proportion of girls who took chemistry at the General Certificate of Secondary Education (GCSE) level: about one in four in 1988 as compared with one in six in 1979. In 1988, one in every five girls had taken physics, as compared with one in every eight in 1979. Overall, girls had achieved greater examination success than boys at the GCSE and equivalent levels. The proportion attaining grades A-D in five or more subjects, for example, was consistently higher than that for boys. Boys were proportionately 
**Analysis**
The text discusses the initiatives taken by the government and educational institutions to reduce sex stereotyping in schools and encourage girls to pursue science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) subjects. The text highlights the importance of equality of opportunity in education and its impact on girls' examination performance. The focus on education and employment suggests that the primary concern is the development of human capital, which is a key aspect of economic development.

**Category**
Education, Employment