Education minister Evarist Bartolo has announced a series of measures to improve the performance of state school.

Speaking at a press conference this morning, he said that only 44.5 per cent of students got the required qualifications to continue in post secondary education, a situation which could nto be allowed to continue.

He said primary schools with major literary problems would be identified so that an action plan could be drawn up.

Students with literacy problems would be supported as from form one of the coming scholastic year. This would also partly address behavioural problems as the educational experience would become more relevant to these students.

Mr Bartolo said the introduction of middle schools would make schools more manageable. In some case, the middle school would not be located in the same building as the senior school.

He said the  introduction of co-ed in all government secondary schools would enhance the overall performance as girls tended to do better than boys.

Other measures would include the introduction of more vocational subjects to address those students who were not completing secondary schools with the basic skills.

There would also be introduction of more B-Tech subjects.

Mr Bartolo said a programme tailor made for students who have not applied for 'O' level exams has been introduced. 353 students were invited, but 150 still refused. In some cases students had not been going to school for two years, the minister complained.

He also confirmed that as from this October, students who do not attend religion lessons will be called for ethics lessons – focused on basic values such as tolerance.

Mr Bartolo explained that the reforms were motivated by the fact that Malta fared very poorly in early school leaving and basic skills and Maltese students performed poorly in mathematics, science, languages and literacy, as shown in the PIRLS and TIMSS studies published in March 2013. These studies, never previously published, showed that not only were the problems not being addressed, but they were not even being acknowledged.

He said that mixed ability teaching was another issue which was considered a priority. It was something that educators have mentioned in meetings with the ministry representatives. There are increased requests for the education policy to move towards addressing individual learning needs of students and the ministry would be working towards this goal.

He said the ministry was also reviewing the way assessments and examinations took place and would be looking to provide a more inclusive solution that catered for the needs of students. Ongoing training for educators would also be considered a priority in order to provide students with the highest standards in education.