50% of NI girls who left school in 2016 went to university

The school-leavers statistics for 2015/16 have just been published

Just over half (50.3%) of girls who left school in Northern Ireland in 2016 went on to university, compared to just over a third of boys (35.7%).

Overall, 43% of pupils who left school last year went on to university.

The school-leavers statistics for 2015/16 have just been published by the Department of Education.

Proportionately, more Catholic school-leavers went on to higher education than their Protestant counterparts.

About 46% of Catholic pupils entered university in 2016, compared to just under 39% of Protestants.

Higher education

However, more than a third of pupils (34.4%) also started study in further education (FE) colleges in 2016.

Overall, 95.8% of 2015/16 school-leavers were recorded by their school as entering education, employment or some other form of training.

The statistics also show that pupils living in the Lisburn and Castlereagh council area were most likely to go to university in 2016.

In the borough, 805 of 1,635 (49.2%) of school-leavers entered higher education in 2016.

That compares to 953 of 2,609 (36.9%) pupils in the Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon council area, which had the lowest proportion of pupils entering university in 2016.