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Italian school dropout trends and educational disparities

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2026-10-26 02:54 UTC → 2026-10-27 07:53 UTC · added ~~removed~~

Italy has reached a national school dropout rate of 8.2%, meeting the European Union’s 9% target five years ahead of the 2030 deadline. Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara reported that approximately 520,000 young people have returned to the school system since 2022, contributing to a drop in the dropout rate from 11.5% to 7.3% in previous assessments, eventually settling at 8.2% in 2025. Despite these improvements, significant disparities persist. Dropout rates in vocational institutes (5.3%) remain approximately four times higher than in high schools (1.3%), while technical institutes report a rate of 3.7%. Regional gaps remain a major factor; for instance, data from the Openpolis Foundation shows Catania has the highest rate of young people (aged 18 to 24) leaving school before obtaining a diploma at 26.5%, followed by Palermo at 19.8% and Messina at 14.6%. In Bari, the San Nicola district reports a 26.6% dropout rate, and among foreign populations in Bari, the rate averages 60%. Regarding student competency, recent INVALSI data highlights a critical challenge: while “implicit dispersion” previously fell to 6.3%, newer reports indicate that approximately 46% of students fail to reach adequate levels in Italian, and 48% fall short in mathematics by the end of secondary education. ~~The National Coordination~~ Data from the Istat Bes Report further indicates similar struggles at the middle school level, where 43.1% of ~~Human Rights Teachers noted that~~ third-year students lack sufficient proficiency in Italian and 45.5% in Mathematics. These figures represent a ~~substantial portion of youth completes schooling without consolidating fundamental skills, necessitating structural changes to teaching methods~~ worsening trend since the pandemic, with the most significant difficulties observed among students in Southern Italy and ~~resource distribution.~~ foreign-born students.

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