Educational Attainment of Young People by Age 19, 2006/07

Statistics on educational attainment include data for Wales for the period 2002/03 to 2006/07. These statistics are published for the first time as experimental statistics and we welcome comments on the statistical release.

The key points from the release for persons aged 19 in 2006/07 are:

• 96 per cent had attained the level 1 threshold, 71 per cent had level 2 and 46 per cent had level 3.
• Level 2 attainment increased by 23 percentage points between ages 15 and 19. Level 3 attainment increased by 10 percentage points between ages 17 and 19.
• Level 1 and 2 attainment at each age from 15 to 18 was generally higher for subsequent cohorts.
• The proportion of females achieving each level was higher than for males at all ages, although the size of this gap decreased as age increased.
• Most of level 1 and 2 attainment by age 15 was through academic qualifications, while for post-16 it was vocational. Most of level 3 attainment by age 19 was through level 3 general qualifications.
• Generally for all levels, post-16 attainment through vocational routes was slightly higher for males than for females.

Attainment at each age includes attainment throughout the whole academic year. The definition of age used throughout this release is academic age (age as at 31 August prior to the start of the academic year). Post-16 is defined as between the ages of 15 and 19.

Level thresholds represent a volume, or ‘size’ of qualifications at a specific level on the National Qualifications Framework (NQF). Three thresholds have been established:

• Level 1 – a volume of qualifications at Level 1 equivalent to the volume of 5 GCSEs at Grade D-G
• Level 2 – a volume of qualifications at Level 2 equivalent to the volume of 5 GCSEs at Grade A*-C
• Level 3 – a volume of qualifications at Level 3 equivalent to the volume of 2 A-Levels

Further information

Summary tables containing further data for the 5 cohorts of young people in this release, including by qualification type, are available on the StatsWales website.

Contact

Tel: 029 2082 5378
E-mail: post16ed.stats@wales.gsi.gov.uk

Next update

February 2010 (provisional - to be confirmed on the Due Out Soon page)