Romania registers the highest share of ‘early school leavers’ (young people aged 18-24 leaving early from education and training) among the EU member states, at 16.6% compared to a European average of 9.5%.<\/p>\n
At the EU level, the share of young people who decided to leave education and vocational training early has decreased constantly in the last 10 years (from 11.8% in 2013 to 9.5%), which brings member countries closer to achieving the goal of reaching below 9% by 2030, according to Eurostat<\/a> data.<\/p>\n Already, 16 member countries have reached the target for 2030, the best situation being in Croatia (2%), Poland and Greece (3.7% each), and Ireland (4%).<\/p>\n At the opposite pole are Romania (16.6%), Spain (13.7%), Germany (12.8%), and Hungary (11.6%), where the percentage of young people who give up education after the age of 18 is the highest picked up.<\/p>\n Romania is also the EU state with the lowest share of the 25-34-year-old population with university education, of only 23%, according to Eurostat data for 2023.<\/p>\n