Nearly 70,000 Hungarian students are on the brink of dropping out

The Hungarian Educational Authority has published the data of the second school year of 2017/2018 concerning the rates of students who are likely to drop out of school. The situation is nothing near satisfactory.

The concept of a student endangered by dropping out appeared in January 2015, in the amendment of the law of public education. According to the definition, a student is in danger of dropping out if their average in a given school year is 3 or below, or, if their average compared to their results in the last year are decreased by over 1.1 grades.

The total number of students is 746,258 in the examined classes – between 5^th and 12^th grade – and 66,121 students are in the danger of dropping out of school. This means that almost 9% of the students are concerned. The situation in the elementary school is the worst; 41,682 pupils are likely to drop out before finishing elementary education – as 24.hu processed the data of the Hungarian Educational Authority.

Data: www.kir.hu/kir2esl/Kimutatas/VeszelyeztetettTanulokMegoszlasa

From the chart, it is clear that the distribution of the problem is very uneven concerning the counties. It is the lowest Vas county for example, ‘only’ 1,341 students, but in Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén county it is the second highest number, 7,397 students are endangered by dropping out.

If we compare the number of students and the number of those who are endangered by dropping-out, then we can see, that while in Csongrád county, less than 6% while in Nógrád county, more than 16% of students are concerned by dropping out. If the different school types are concerned, elementary for example, then it is evident that in the region of Northern Hungary, every fifth pupil is about to drop out of school.

Data: www.kir.hu/kir2esl/Kimutatas/VeszelyeztetettTanulokMegoszlasa

There is a catch. One of the goals of the European Union is to improve the rates of employment by 2020. This intention is greatly connected to the educational qualifications of people. Therefore, one of the strategies of the Europe 2020 plan is to confine the ratio of those with low educational qualification. The programme’s aim is to decrease the percentage of those 18-24-year olds, who leave the education system without at least an intermediate or vocational qualification, to under 10% in Europe.

The situation is not bright even concerning the vocational side of things since the government lowered the age of compulsory education to age 16, the number of pupils who dropped-out grew fast. Many students choose public work instead of sitting behind a school desk. While the percentage of pupils who are likely to drop out is only 5.76% in the elementary schools, but the statistic for vocational schools is much, much higher, 16% to be exact.

The disadvantage of the Northern region is also observable concerning the vocation education. Nearly 19% of students (18.83%) are in danger of dropping out.

The government have admitted that the current financing system encourages families with difficulties to send their children to work after 16 when they reach the end of their compulsory education. Although many students disappear from the educational system, the government have not yet taken steps to examine the possibility of reverting the mandatory age of education to 18. If we closely examine the data provided, the problem starts earlier than 16; in 7^th and 8^th grade at elementary school and during the 1^st and 2^nd grade in high school.

This might explain why Hungarians stop choosing higher level education. Click HERE for the article.

According to the data of the Educational Authority, the performance of the students can also be viewed by county. In Borsod county, 13.3% of pupils had a lower average than 3 in elementary school and 2.5 in high school. Szabolcs county looks even worse, the same is true to 15% of total students.

The University of Károly Eszterházy suggested a so-called ‘Experience school’ to fight against the phenomenon of dropping out from school. The basic program has started this September in 60 schools and according to plans, 1,500 schools will utilize this teaching technique until 2021.

If you are interested in new and innovative methodologies, you can read about Lego’s system utilized in the University of Nyíregyháza.

Source: 24.hu