In 2020, the number of persons with a low level of education stood at 203,151 accounting for nearly half of those aged 15 and over, the National Statistics Office (NSO) said.
A low level of education comprises of “persons with no schooling, primary education, special schools for disabled, and persons who attained a secondary level education and have less than 2 O levels or equivalent qualifications.”
The NSO has published revised educational attainment statistics from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) for 2010 - 2020. The revision is a result of the realignment of the International Standard Classification of Education (ISCED) with the Malta Qualifications Framework (MQF).
“This revision was necessary to ensure better compliance with European Regulations governing education statistics and improve comparability of results at the European level. NSO reviewed the current educational system and the entry requirements at different levels. This exercise mainly focussed on state-run post-secondary institutions since this level of education is experiencing an increase in the range of courses offered to prospective applicants.”
“The outcome of this exercise led to a reclassification by which attainment at ISCED levels 2 and 3 is determined.”
“LFS estimates indicated that, in 2020, the number of persons with a low level of education stood at 203,151, accounting for nearly half of those aged 15 and over. Those having a medium level of education amounted to 129,363 (29.5%) while persons with a high level of education totalled 105,750 (24.1%).”
Medium levels of education refers to persons with a secondary level education and having 2 O levels or equivalent qualifications or more, persons with a post-secondary level attainment who have at least obtained 1 Intermediate or A level or equivalent qualification. High levels of education refer to persons with a tertiary level education and with qualifications ranging from University diploma to doctorate level, the NSO said.
“The share of persons aged 15 to 64 having a low level of education decreased from 59.6% in 2010 to 37% in 2020. Conversely, the share of persons with a medium or high level of education increased by 8.7 and 14 percentage points respectively in the last eleven years,” the NSO said.
On average, over the past eleven years, the number of employed persons having a low level of education remained relatively stable around 80,317 persons. On the contrary, the share of those employed with a medium level of education almost doubled within a decade. Similarly, employed persons attaining a high level of education increased from 34,234 in 2010 to 88,920 in 2020.
Across the years, persons with a higher level of education were more likely to be in employment when compared to those with low attainment levels. In 2020, out of every 100 persons aged 20 to 64 years with a high level of education, 89 were employed. Similarly, the employment rate for persons with a medium level of education was 81.9%. Persons with a low level of education had the lowest employment rate (64.1%).
“Further to this revision, the rate of early leavers from education and training (ELET rate) was updated to 12.6%, in 2020, a drop of 8.8 percentage points from 2010 levels. Among males the rate dropped from 28.3% in 2010 to 14.7% in 2020 while that for females declined by 3.8 percentage points over the last eleven years reaching 10.2 per cent in 2020. Although Malta’s levels for the ELET indicator declined significantly over the years, in 2020, the rate was 2.6 percentage points higher than the EU 28 2020 target of 10%. At the same time, data for 2020 showed that the percentage of persons aged 20 to 24 years achieving at least an upper secondary education was 85.1%. This indicator was higher for females (88%) when compared to males (82.6%).