Engagement in education and training is going backwards, new data reveals, as governments grapple to reverse poor school attendance rates in an effort to reach ambitious tertiary targets.
The Productivity Commission’s report on government services, released on Monday night, showed school attendance and retention rates were continuing to decline, alongside a drop-off in further studies.
The proportion of people between 15 and 24 who were enrolled in education or training in 2023 was 61.1%, the latest figures showed, compared with 62.8% the previous year.
The highest decline, at almost two percentage points, was among 15- to 19-year-olds (81% compared with 82.8% last year). 42.9% of people aged 20-24 were enrolled in studies, a minor fall on the previous year (43.4%).
The rates throw into doubt the viability of the Labor government fulfilling its goal to ramp up university admissions, particularly among priority cohorts.
The education minister, Jason Clare, has set an ambitious target for 55% of young people to have a university degree in the next decade, requiring an additional 900,000 people to be enrolled at university.
But the Productivity Commission report suggests enrolments are continuing to trend downwards.
Nationally in 2023, 65.7% of people between 20 and 64 had a qualification at certificate III level or above, the data shows, down from 66.2% in 2022.
Speaking on ABC last week, Clare said Australia had to “do more as a country” to make sure more people were finishing school and going on to university.
“In the years ahead more people are going to need a university degree because more and more jobs will require university qualifications,” he said.
Across all demographics, participation in tertiary studies has declined, the commission’s report said. In total, 19% of 15- to 19-year-olds were not enrolled in any education or training in 2023, a two percentage point increase on the previous year.
Of those enrolled, 13.4% were completing bachelor degrees or above, a slight decrease on the previous year (13.8%).
29.5% of 20- to 24-year-olds were enrolled in a bachelors degree or above, compared with 31.1% the previous year. More than half (57.2%) weren’t completing any education or training.
The report also showed school attendance and retention rates remained on their trajectory of long-term decline.
In 2023 86.4% of students from year seven to 10 regularly attended school, down from 91.2% in 2015.
By year 12 the retention rate for full-time students was just 79% – the lowest in the past 10 years of data being reported. At government schools, the retention rate was even lower, at 73.5%, almost 15% below non-government schools (87.2%). Retention rates refer to the proportion of students who have continued their studies after their first year.
There were also significant geographical disparities. While 89.6% of students regularly attended school in major cities from year one to 10, the rates fell to 81.1% in remote areas and 66.1% in very remote areas – including just 51.8% in very remote areas of the Northern Territory.
The Albanese government argues that fixing the education gap via early intervention programs is key to improving retention rates.
“Only 20% of those kids who fall behind … catch up by the time they’re in high school, which helps to explain why we’re now seeing a drop in the number of kids finishing high school,” Clare told the ABC last week.
“We’re seeing a drop in the percentage of kids finishing high school in public schools and kids from the bush, kids from poor families, and this is happening … at a time where it’s more important to finish school than it was when we went to school.”
Disparities also remained among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students, with an attendance gap across all year levels in all jurisdictions.
66.9% of Indigenous students regularly attended school in year 10 – an 18.8% gap compared with their peers – with even lower rates in the NT. Just over half of Indigenous year 10s in the NT attended school regularly, a 35.2% gap compared with their counterparts.
