NEARLY 15,000 Scottish students dropped out from college last year.
New figures show 27% of students on full-time further education courses withdrew in 2010/11. Overall, 20,000 full-time students enrolled last year failed to achieve a qualification.
The stark figures publsihed by the Scottish Funding Council (SFC) come at a time when youth unemployment in Scotland is at its highest level for a generation.
Last night, students and staff representatives urged colleges to do more to ensure students benefited from courses.
Robin Parker, president of NUS Scotland, which represents students, described the figures as 2extremely worrying".
He said: "This is a huge waste of public resources, but, more importantly, a huge waste of talent. If we’re serious about tackling the root cause and effects of unemployment then we absolutely have to be looking to colleges to be a major partner in this.
"At a time of spiralling unemployment, particularly youth unemployment, every student who drops out risks becoming another member of Scotland's lost generation."
Mr Parker said additional support funds such as bursaries were a vital part of ensuring better retention rates.
David Belsey, further education officer for the Educational Institute of Scotland union, which represents staff, said the drop-out rates varied widely from college to college.
"Scottish colleges produce a range of student completion outcomes ranging from 67% to 83% for full time students. This figure illustrates the fragmented nature of the Scottish further education sector in which every college is an independent entity."
However, John Spencer, convener of Scotland’s Colleges, said retention figures had improved over the past year.
"There has been improvement in retention, which is welcome, but this issue remains far from straightforward – these are statistics which are not a complete picture and give no record of the circumstances under which students leave their studies," he said.
"What is often unfairly termed a drop out often means a student has changed course, or has taken up a job, which, having been to college, they were now able to get. For those students, this is a successful outcome.
"While more can and will be done, colleges believe the recording of performance must be addressed to give a fair picture of success, as these will be considered in outcome agreements for the sector as of next year.
"It is also important that there be secure bursary support for college students to ensure no-one has to leave their studies because the student support funding allocated from Government runs out."
A spokeswoman for the SFC said: "There are many reasons why students leave college before completing their course – for example, securing a job or a place at university, or moving to another course that better suits their needs.
"Nevertheless, we are working with colleges to improve our understanding of what lies behind the figures and to address the challenge of those students who leave college without having a positive destination."
The report found full-time student numbers funded by SFC increased by 4% from 2009-10 to an all-time high of 79,631 in 2010-11. Total student numbers now stand at 305,969.
Students from the postcode areas in which the 20% most deprived members of the population live accounted for 31% per cent of all further education activity.
And 93% of staff had a formal teaching qualification in 2010-11, an increase of about 3.5% over 2009-10.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article