Students who leave school without O-levels will soon have the possibility to obtain certification at lower levels in a drive to tackle early school leavers.

The current set up sees secondary students sit for SEC exams at the end of Form 5, that gives them the equivalent of Level 3 on the European qualifications system.

Students who do not obtain the grades in their SEC exams end up with no qualification and have to undergo a foundation course if they want to enter post-secondary schooling at MCAST.

Under the new strategy, an alternative path that certifies students at Level 1 and 2, will give students the chance to start MCAST courses at Level 3 without the need to undertake the foundation course.

Education Minister Evarist Bartolo said the important thing was not to measure the number of students who start foundation courses but those who actually finish them and progress to other courses.

He said the current rate of drop-outs was too high and the alternative path to obtain Level 1 and 2 certification would help fill in a gap in the system.

This forms part of the strategic plan for the Prevention of Early School Leaving, released this afternoon by the educational authorities.

Early school leavers are defined as those students who would have left compulsory schooling without at least five SEC passes and who are neither in education and training.

Last year 21 per cent of people aged between 18 and 24 were considered to be early school leavers, almost double the EU average but a vast improvement from the 28 per cent registered in 2009.

Mario Cardona from the Early School Leaving Unit said the strategy had various initiatives to address the phenomenon while students were still at school.

He said schools had to pull down the barriers and involve parents more at an educational level while the classroom had to become relevant for students by having different teaching techniques that reached out to different abilities.

The strategy can be accessed by clicking the PDF document below.