The bar chart illustrates the number of males and females engaged in further education in Britain. It shows whether they were studying full-time or part-time and is divided into three periods.
Overall, the number of men and women studying part-time outnumbered those studying full-time by a significant margin. While both modes were relatively similar between the sexes, there was some variance, especially in the 1990s when the number of women studying part-time increased substantially.
With regard to full-time education, the number of male students approximately doubled from around 100,000 in 1970 to well over 200,000 by the end of 1991. For women, the trajectory was less consistent, rising sharply in the first decade and then tapering off to an almost identical level to that of men in the 1990s.
The number of males engaged in part-time study over the three periods fluctuated, dropping from approximately 1 million to 900,000 over the three periods; meanwhile, the number of women studying part-time steadily increased from nearly 800,000 in 1970-71 to well above 1 million in 1990-91.