THE student dropout rate in schools has shown a significant downward slide over the last three years, Deputy Education Minister Lim Hui Ying said.

Based on the ministry’s statistics, she said that the dropout rate for pupils in primary schools decreased from 0.12% in 2019 to 0.07% in 2022, while secondary schools the rate dropped from 1.14% to 0.99% in the same period. 

“From 2019 to 2022, at the primary school level, student dropouts involving Years 3, 4 and 6 show an increase, while Years 2 and 5 show no student dropouts and a decrease in that period. 

“At the secondary school level, there was an increase in the dropout rate of students for Form 2 in the period from 2019 to 2022, while there was a decrease in the dropout rate involving Forms 3, 4 and 5 in the period in question,” the Tanjong lawmaker told the Dewan Rakyat today. 

Lim was responding to a question from Lee Chean Chung (Petaling Jaya-PH), who asked the Education Ministry to state the dropout rate in schools and the breakdown of reasons for the cases by year, age and gender from 2019 to 2023. 

The deputy minister said that there were no dropouts among female pupils at primary schools for the years 2019 to 2022. 

However, the dropout rate for primary school male pupils showed a decrease from 0.16% in 2019 to 0.09% in 2022. 

Meanwhile, at the secondary school level, Lim said that there were more dropouts among female students compared to male students. 

“At the secondary school level, the dropout rate of male students showed a decrease compared to the dropout rate of female students, which increased from 2019 to 2022. 

“In 2019, the dropout rate of male students recorded was 0.72% compared to 0.29% in 2022. Meanwhile, the dropout rate of female students was at 0.40% in 2019 and increased to 0.71% in 2022,” she said. 

Lim said the Students’ Application Database System from 2019 to 2023 showed among the reasons students drop out of school are not being interested in pursuing studies, (opting to) work, family problems, marriage and difficulty in getting to school due to long distance. 

She said the Education Ministry had carried out an outreach programme to help dropouts return to school.

In 2022, the programme had successfully returned a total of 5,121 primary school pupils and 1,711 secondary school students, she said.

Lim said the ministry is taking proactive steps in assisting students to ensure the dropout rate is reduced. – October 11, 2023.