HSC students are increasingly choosing subjects such as legal studies and construction with their eye on a future job, at the expense of languages and complex maths and science subjects.
A Fairfax Media analysis of HSC enrolments over the past decade reveals the largest enrolments growth has occurred in subjects such as community and family studies, PDHPE, dance and legal studies.
Vocational courses such as construction, hospitality and metal engineering are also thriving, drawing students away from some traditional subjects.
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It comes as Fairfax Media revealed this week the proportion of students studying a foreign language is at a historic low.
Board of Studies NSW president Tom Alegounarias said some of the trends can be explained by students' perceptions of how subjects relate to potential careers.
''More students are treating the HSC as a pre-preparation for a vocational path, a taster for a career,'' he said. ''We're a more social-oriented community with a focus on economics and jobs. Our young people are much more ambitious and instrumentalist.''
He said that partly explains the significant growth in vocational education and training (VET) courses, which lead to a skill certification. The proportion of students taking a VET course has grown from about one in four a decade ago to about one in three this year.
Hospitality is the most popular, while the fastest growing are construction and metal and engineering, which have both more than doubled over 10 years.
Mr Alegounarias said the shift is also a reflection of more students staying on in the senior years since the school leaving age was lifted to 17 in 2010.
Yet, despite a 15 per cent growth in the overall student body, enrolments in higher level maths and science subjects are either declining or plateauing.
While ''softer'' science subjects such as biology and senior science have experienced strong growth, the physics cohort is the same size as it was in 2003 and the number of students studying advanced mathematics has dropped 17 per cent.
The trend adds to fears Australia is facing a critical skills shortage of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) skills.
Mr Alegounarias said an explanation for the decline in high-level mathematics ''is the availability of teachers who are confident teaching it''.
''When students do study science and mathematics at university level, fewer and fewer are choosing to go into teaching,'' he said. ''Having said that, keeping 85 per cent of kids studying mathematics when it's optional and not fashionable is something we're desperate to hang on to.''
The opposite is true of English and history subjects, which are becoming increasingly popular.
NSW Secondary Principals' Council president Lila Mularczyk said she has noticed more students taking on creative arts subjects.
While still a relatively small subject, the number of students studying dance has almost doubled over the past decade. And music 1, the only arts subject more popular with male students, has grown by 34 per cent.
Physical Education is also one of the fastest-growing subjects, from 10,342 to 14,048 over the past decade.
The popularity of Geography continues to decline, with 26 per cent fewer students studying it in 2013 compared to 2003.
