Minister: concerns about the dropout of boys with a migration background
The dropout of students in higher education is a point of concern, Minister Van Engelshoven said in the Lower House last Monday. "Especially the high dropout rate among boys with a migration background."
Picture: National government
The minister said this to the House of Representatives in a debate on the influential report 'The State of Education', in which the Education Inspectorate warned of declining educational achievements and increasing segregation.
The debate was mainly about secondary education. The MPs delved into the issue of Limburg pre-vocational secondary school students whose exam has been declared invalid. But other topics were also discussed.
The Minister is of the opinion that regional resources, intended to improve the transition between MBO and HBO, should also be specifically deployed for this dropout. The previous cabinet allocated 7,5 million euros per year for this.
Ethnicity
It may indicate a minor change of course. In the previous term of office, the cabinet preferred to speak of children of low-educated parents or of students who are the first in their family to study. Ethnicity received less emphasis.
An analysis of the HOP previously showed that MBO students do well when they go to HBO. The real problems are indeed for boys and students with a migrant background.
Fewer and fewer MBO students are attending HBO. At the beginning of this year, Minister Van Engelshoven said that MBO students do not all have to go to higher professional education. But if that decline is the result of “an unconscious choice”, she finds it “obviously very worrying”.
