School attendance
A total of 1 166 525 students were enrolled in Austria's schools during the 2010/11 school year. Whereas the number of pupils attending primary schools (Volkschulen) has been falling consistently for some years because of the decrease in the birthrate over previous years, secondary academic schools and secondary technical and vocational colleges have been reporting record student numbers.
Up until the 2000/01 school year, constantly rising student numbers were the norm in Austria's primary schools. Subsequently though, decreases in the birthrate since 1995 have started to have an effect. According to the calculations of Statistics Austria, there were in total 327 663 primary school pupils in the 2010/11 school year, a reduction of 66 000 on the figure reported ten years ago (minus 16.7%). An analysis of the birthrates over the past few years and the population forecasts based on these figures reveals that an upturn in the current trend is unlikely within the next five years. It will probably not be until the 2016/17 school year that we shall see a slight increase again in Austria-wide pupil figures for the primary school sector.
Secondary academic schools (AHS) cannot presently complain of any lack of student numbers. 112 330 students were in first-stage secondary academic schools (AHS-Unterstufe). In lower secondary schools (Hauptschulen, including Neue Mittelschulen), however, the number of students has decreased by 13.9% to 226 940 compared with 2000/01. Over the coming school years, particularly in the lower secondary school sector, we can expect a significant downturn in student numbers because of the change in the population structure. This may also result in a more pronounced change in the proportion of students in first-stage secondary academic schools compared to those in the lower secondary school sector. Currently there are 2.0 lower secondary school students to each AHS student; ten years ago the figure was 2.5.
In secondary technical and vocational colleges the increase continued in the 2010/11 school year, which saw record figures. In total, 55 884 students attended crafts, technical and arts colleges, 38 292 colleges of business administration, 22 905 colleges of management and the service industries and 3 709 colleges of agriculture and forestry. Overall, there are over one-tenth more students in secondary technical and vocational colleges than 10 years ago. A total of 88 412 students are currently taught in second-stage secondary academic schools (AHS-Oberstufe), including work-related types of school, a rise of 13.7% compared with ten years ago.
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