A total of 95.6 percent of Italy’s final year high school students had sufficient grades to take the nationwide end-of-year exam in 2015, and of these, 99.4 percent passed the exam, compared to 99.2 percent in 2014. The number of students who obtained a final grade above 70 percent increased to 62.2 percent from 59.6 percent, while the number of “60s”, the passing grade, decreased. The news was announced by the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities, and Research. A total of 0.9 percent of the students graduated cum laude, compared to 0.8 percent last year. The regions with the highest number of cum laude graduates were: Apulia with 788; Campania with 455; Sicily with 372; and Lazio with 345.
Overall, these were some of the numbers reported from 2014 to 2015: the amount of 100 out of 100 grades rose from 4.5 percent to 4.9 percent; grades between 91-99 rose to 8.4 percent from 7.7 percent; between 81-90 to 18.9 percent from 18 percent; between 71-80 to 29.1 percent from 28.6 percent; while those between 61-70 fell from 30.8 percent to 29.3 percent, and the number of 60s from 9.6 percent to 8.4 percent. Italy has various secondary education systems, with more final-year students in technical and professional institutes obtaining full marks and grades above 70 percent compared to 2014.
Results also improved in traditional high schools, with 1.5 percent of the final-year students graduating cum laude, 6.9 percent receiving full marks, 10.7 percent in the 91-99 range, and 22.3 percent in the 81-90 group. The Education Ministry also announced the global results for students in lower years, noting that the number of poor students decreased. A total of 9 percent failed the year, compared to 9.8 in 2014. Most of the non-admissions to the end-of-year exams came from first-years, with 13.7 percent failing to achieve sufficient grades to sit the exams, compared to 14.8 percent last year. The percentage of students who failed the exams was 15.2 in professional institutes, 11.5 in technical institutes, and 4.8 in traditional high schools. A total of 25 percent failed one subject (25.1 percent in 2014), meaning one out of four students will have to resit the “pending” exam over the summer.
Out of these, 29.1 percent attend technical institutes, 27.6 professional institutes, and 21.2 percent traditional high schools. The region with the most passing students was Apulia at 72 percent, followed by Umbria (71.5 percent), Molise (71.4 percent), and Calabria (70.8 percent). The highest number of pending students was in Sardinia (30 percent), followed by Lombardy (28 percent), and Tuscany (27.4 percent). Sardinia also had the highest number of failed students at 14.1 percent, followed by Campania (11.2 percent), and Sicily (10.5 percent).
(AGI) .
