Over 60K Pre-Primary To Secondary Students During 2023-24 Year

During the academic year 2023-2024, total enrolment in pre-primary, primary and secondary education reached 60,197 students, representing a 1.2% increase compared to the previous year.

According to NSO Malta, males accounted for 51.8% of the student population. Age distribution showed that 45.5% of students were between 5 and 10 years old, while 38.1% were aged 11-15.

State schools enrolled 59.6% of students, church-run schools 26.7%, and independent schools 13.7%. Within mandatory education, 50,645 students were enrolled, with 54.4% in primary schools and 45.6% in secondary schools.

Compared to 2022-2023, primary and secondary school enrolments increased by 0.7% and 2.3% respectively. Average class size was 18.6 students per class at primary level and 19.2 at secondary level.

State schools had the lowest average class sizes, while church schools had the highest. Year 6 recorded the largest primary class size at 19.1 students, and Year 8 the largest secondary class size at 19.8 students.

The Northern Harbour District had the largest share of school levels (33.7%) and enrolled students (37.6%), followed by the Southern Harbour District at 19.8% and 16.6% respectively. Gozo and Comino had the smallest share of enrolled students at 7.3%.

Most students attended schools within their own district (69.0%), while 31.0% commuted to schools outside their district.

Enrolment of non-Maltese students increased by 8.3%, with 65.6% of these being third-country nationals. Nearly a quarter of private school students were non-Maltese (24.8%) and 23.1% of state school students.

Church schools remained almost entirely Maltese (99.2%). At secondary level, Italian was the most studied language (53.3%), followed by French (23.5%), Spanish (16.1%) and German (12.2%), with an 8.5% increase in Spanish learners.

Female students were more likely to study French (29.8%) than male students (17.6%), a difference of 12.2 percentage points.

#MaltaDaily