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We are here to help you!

Should you require any help or assistance about this publication, please email us at social@cas.gov.lb

Or give us a call at +961 1 373 164

You can also visit our website www.cas.gov.lb where you can download free available statistics and indicators about Lebanon.

Suggested Citation: Education in Lebanon, Statistics In Focus (SIF), Central Administration of Statistics, Lebanon, Issue number 3, April 2012.

This publication is free of charge and can be found at the following link: http://www.cas.gov.lb/index.

php?option=com_content&view=article&id=58&Item id=40

Previous SIF publications you may have missed reading: link: http://www.cas.gov.lb/index.

php?option=com_content&view=article&id=58&Item id=40

● SIF – Issue 1: The Labour Market in Lebanon . October 2011

● SIF – Issue 2: Population and Housing in Lebanon . April, 2012

Designed by: Khodor Daher – Central Administration

of Statistics, Lebanon

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Within the context of the EU Twining Project between the Central Administration of Statistics (CAS) Lebanon and the Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency (NISRA) Northern Ireland, UK, CAS has the pleasure making available to users the third issue of the Statistics In Focus (SIF), a series of publications on Social Statistics entitled ‘Education in Lebanon’.

This issue of the SIF contains key indicators and figures on Education in Lebanon; it is based on official statistics and can be considered as starting point for users who are looking for general statistics and information about the topic.

The Central Administration of Statistics wishes to thank the persons who contributed to this publication.

Dr. MARAL TUTELIAN GUIDANIAN

Director General

Central Administration of Statistics

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Education in Lebanon

This issue of SIF looks briefly at Education in Lebanon using key indicators and figures available from a number of surveys conducted by the Central Administration of Statistics (CAS) in Lebanon in recent years.

Its objective is to provide users with important information on Education in Lebanon enabling them to understand the current situation and to compare Lebanon to neighbouring countries.

For this publication we have primarily used the most recent available data from the Multiple Indicators Clusters Survey, Round 3 (MICS3) conducted by the Central Administration of Statistics (CAS) in 2009 in partnership with the UNICEF-Beirut office.

However for some indicators we used surveys previously conducted by CAS and sometimes we also used administrative data sources gathered by other Ministries.

This will be noted where applicable.

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:

Introduction 2

General structure of the education 3 About schools, teachers and pupils 4 Students and universities 6 From a gender point of view 8 Vocational and technical education 9 Education and household’s

characteristics 10

Illiteracy in Lebanon 11

Lebanon compared to

neighbouring countries 12

Glossary and classifications 13

Figures will sometimes not sum to 100 % that is because of the rounding.

In this publication the use of [*] in tables and graphs indicates that numbers were below 25 persons, and [n.n] indicates that numbers were between 25 and 50 persons. Those figures should be considered with caution.

General notice:

Disclosure notice:

CAS= Central Administration of Statistics

MICS = Multiple Indicators Clusters Survey - Round 3 - 2009 CERD = Center of Education Research and Development ISCED = International Stand Classification of Education

Acronyms:

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Introduction

In 2009-2010, pupils, university students and students in vocational and technical education represented about 32% of the total population of Lebanon; overall the number of school children was approximately 5 times more than the number of university students. The majority of pupils and students were Lebanese, but more non-Lebanese were found to be enrolled in universities than in schools.

Compulsory education in Lebanon is usually up to six years of primary schooling. Illiteracy among women was twice that among men, however above primary level there was little difference between women’s and men’s education.

Schools in Lebanon were evenly distributed among public and private sectors, but the majority of pupils were enrolled in private schools. The pupil to teacher ratio indicates that there was on average one teacher for every seven pupils in the public schools. But the situation was different in the private schools were there was, on average, one teacher for 12 pupils.

Statistics showed that in general there was a preference for literary studies rather than scientific ones at university. We also noted there were 6% more women than men enrolled in university courses in 2009-2010. While women represented just under half of enrolments at other universities they made up almost two thirds of enrolments at the Lebanese universities. In vocational and technical education women and men were almost equally distributed.

Household’s characteristics were also looked at because we considered they could have an implication on the choice of the schooling type. The level of education of the head of the household had an impact on the choice of school type with pupils from younger and better educated households more likely to be in private schools.

Drop out between secondary and university is much higher than that which occurs at earlier school levels.

We also looked at the profile of households with illiterate persons at home and found that almost a quarter of households in Lebanon had at least one illiterate household member. While at the same time 38% of total households in Lebanon contained at least one person holding a university degree.

And finally in general the population of Lebanon was multi-lingual; almost a third of the persons

aged 15 years and above spoke French and some 22% spoke English.

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General structure of the education in Lebanon in 2009-2010

Total number of pupils in Lebanon

Total: 942,391

Private schools (pupils): 497,530

Public schools (pupils): 285,399

Other type of schools (pupils): 159,462 (Private free schools)

Lebanese University (students): 72,530

Other Universities(students): 108,037 Total: 180,850

Total number of university students in Lebanon

Total: 95,811

Total number of students in vocational and technical education in Lebanon

CAP students: 470 BP students: 10,079 SP students: 1,351 BT students: 44,813 TS students: 19,488 LT students: 2,007

Private certificates for 3 months: 4,942 Private certificates for one year: 12,661

* This graph is based on data extracted from the Center of Educational Research and Development (CERD):

http://crdp.org/CRDP/Arabic/ar-statistics/STAT_AR/

2009_2010/statistics20092010_Ar.htm

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About schools, teachers and pupils

In 2009-2010 there were 2,882 schools in total in Lebanon evenly distributed between public and private sectors. However the majority of pupils were enrolled in private schools, accounting for 66% of pupils.

The distribution of schools and pupils across regions were similar but we noted that the proportion of pupils in Mount Lebanon was greater than the proportion of schools in that region;

the opposite was the case in North Lebanon, Bekaa and Nabatieh.

0 10 20 30 40

7 8

14

35

12

24

Percentage of pupils

Regions

Mount Lebanon North Lebanon Bekaa South Lebanon Beirut Nabatieh

source: CERD 2009 - 2010

Figure 3: Percentage of pupils by region

0 10 20 30 40

7 9

17

31

11

26

Percentage of schools

Regions

Mount Lebanon North Lebanon

Bekaa South Lebanon

Beirut Nabatieh

source: CERD 2009 - 2010

Figure 4: Percentage of schools by region

Figure 1: Type of Schools in 2009 - 2010

0 10 20 30 40 50

Percentage of schools

Type of schools

3 13

37 Public 47

Private

Private free

UNRWA

source: CERD 2009 - 2010

Figure 2: Pupils and teachers by type of school in

2009 - 2010

Private free

Public Private UNRWA

Percentage

10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Students Teachers

30 13 53 3

43 8 48

2

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In our previous SIF publication dedicated to the ‘Labour Market in Lebanon’ we calculated the economic activity rate by age and found that about 18% of the persons aged 15-19 years have joined the labour market.

That was in October 2011. If you have missed reading this publication, you can still find it online at the following link: http://

Foreign teaching languages

With regard to foreign teaching languages in schools in Lebanon, we noted that 53% of schools used French as teaching language, and some 25% of schools were teaching in English. 22% of schools had both French and English as a common teaching language.

English 25%

French 53%

French and English22%

Figure 6: Percentage of shools by foreign teaching language

Flows between levels at school in 2009

MICS 3 results indicated that Some 97% of pupils were able to achieve their studies with success between primary and complementary levels but 3% of pupils had to repeat their classes. The situation was similar for pupils moving between complementary and secondary levels but quite different for pupils moving between secondary and university.

At this level 7% of pupils had to repeat their classes and 6% dropped out of education at this stage.

Figure 5: Flows between levels at school

Repeated

Advanced Dropped out

Percentage

75 80 85 90 95 100

Primary to Complementary

Complementary to Secondary

Secondary to University 97

94

87 7 2 6

4

[*] [*]

source: MICS 3 survey - 2009 - CAS

Do you remember this?

There were on average seven pupils for one teacher in public schools and 12 pupils per teacher in the private ones.

TAble 1: Ratio of pupils to teachers by type of school (2009 - 2010)

Type of Schools

Public Private free Private UNRWA

7 19 12 21

Ratio of pupils to teachers

Did you know?

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0 5 10 15 20 25 30 35 40 45 Percentage

General programmes Services Education Health & welfare Engineering, manufacturing & construction Science Humanities & arts Social sciences, business & law

Agriculture

¹

0 2 2

11 16

8

21

39

*ISCED: International Standard Classification of Education source: CERD 2009 - 2010

Figure 7: Fields of education in Lebanon by ISCED*

(2009 - 2010)

Students and Universities in 2009 - 2010

According to the CERD statistics there were about 38 universities in Lebanon and 180,850 students enrolled overall. Statistics also indicated that the Lebanese University took up 40% out of the total number of students in Lebanon. 16% of students enrolled in universities in Lebanon were not Lebanese.

The tendency in education was toward literary studies rather than scientific ones !

During the academic year 2009-2010, education was more oriented towards humanities and social sciences; there were more students in the literary than scientific.

39% of students enrolled in universities have chosen Social Sciences, Business and Law.

This field comprises 4 sub-groups namely social and behavioral science, journalism and information, business and administration and finally law. The specific courses of study included economics, sociology, psychology, journalism, marketing, public relations,

finance, banking, insurance, and law.

The second largest field of education chosen by students was Humanities and Arts, in which 21% of students were enrolled.

This field included for example fine arts, performing arts, graphic and audio-visual arts, religion and theology, languages and literature and philosophy

Science, that includes life science, physical

sciences, mathematics and statistics and

computing, was chosen by 16% of students.

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Lebanese University Other Universities

Arabic and oriental literature

Law Social sciences Chemistry English Literature

Biology and natural sciences Psychology

History Business Mathematics

Business Islamic Studies Law

Banking and finance

Computer and communications Management

Computer science Engineering

Information management Pharmacy

6,074 5,872 5,491 4,601 4,268 3,556 3,309 3,298 2,691 2,439 41,599 72,813

18,571 6,809 5,832 3,878 3,468 3,261 2,714 2,643 2,307 2,290 51,773 108,037 Total Students for top ten majors

Total Students in the Lebanese university

Total Students for top ten majors Total Students in private universities

ISCED Classification - major groups Lebanese University Other Universities

General programmes

Education Humanities & arts

Social sciences, business & law Science

Engineering, manufacturing & construction Agriculture

Health and welfare Services

- 1,378 23,664 22,449 14,970 5,673 713 3,560 406 72,813

2 32 31 21 8 1 5 1 100

1 2 13 44 13 13 0 10 2 100 695 2,332 14,458 47,957 14,456 14,209 462 11,085 2,383 108,037 Total

% %

Table 3: All majors taught in Universities in Lebanon by fields of education - ISCED (2009 - 2010)

We looked at the number of students by major, and prepared the table above and noted that the top ten majors’ taught in the Lebanese University accounted for 57%

of total students enrolled in that university.

In private universities the top 10 majors

Based on the number of students by field of education and type of university, results showed that the Lebanese University was mainly chosen by students enrolled in humanities & arts and sciences. Other universities were mostly chosen by students enrolled in social sciences, business

& law, humanities, science and engineering and health & welfare.

accounted for 48% of enrolments. Overall it seems that the majority of students enrolled in the Lebanese University have chosen humanities and social sciences while students of other private universities preferred business oriented majors.

Table 2: Top ten majors taught in Universities in Lebanon

(2009 - 2010)

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Figure 8: Students by sex and type of University

(2009 - 2010) In general there were more women than

men enrolled in universities in 2009-2010.

Out of the total number of students in all universities there were 53% women and 47 % men.

At the Lebanese University there were many more women than men, while in other universities the difference between women and men was not as marked but there were more men than women.

Women are in the majority in education, but also in health and welfare and humanities.

On the other hand men are in the majority in engineering but they also share with women a number of fields where they are almost equal, such as general programmes, social sciences and business; science; agriculture and services.

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70

Women

65

Men

35 45 55

Percentage

Lebanese

University Other

Universities source: CERD 2009 - 2010

From a gender point of view

Percentage

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Education Health & welfar

e Humanities & ar

ts Agricultur

e

Social sciences, business & law

General programmes

Science Services

Engineering, manufacturing

& construction 91

69 31

61 39

55 45

54 46

50 50

47 53

45 55

29 71 9

Women Men

Figure 9: Students by sex and field of education

(2009 - 2010)

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Students in technical education were doing less well compared to students enrolled in vocational education.

Results showed that approximately half of them didn’t succeed in their training programme in 2009-2010.

Vocational and technical education in 2009 - 2010

Percentage

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

95 32 68

8 92

46 54

58 42

50 50

47 53

64 36

48 52

5 CAP BP SP BT TS LT three

months one year

Vocational Technical Private

Certificates

Women Men

Figure 10: Vocational and techincal education by level and sex in (2009 - 2010)

Percentage successful

10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

90 78 74

43 54

40

77 Figure 11: Success rates in vocational and

technical education in (2009 - 2010)

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There was a clear relationship between the education level of the head of household and the type of school pupils were enrolled in. The higher the education level of the head of the household the more likely it was that pupils would be enrolled in a private school. Only 31%

of pupils, whose head of household was illiterate, were enrolled in a private school compared with 82% of pupils whose head of household had a university degree.

For 62% of households none of their members held a university degree. On the other hand 38%

of households had at least one person holding a university degree and 16% had more than one person educated to degree level.

Education and household characteristics

Percentage of type of school

Education level of head of household 31

61

8 34

63

43

54 57

71 82

40

26 17

3 3 3 3 1

Private Public Private free of charge

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

illiterate Pre-school read/writeand

Elementary Intermediary Secondary University

Figure 12: Type of school by the education level of the head of the

household

one person

22% None

62%

two persons 10%

thr

ee persons & mor

e

6%

Figure 13: Household members with university

degree

Did University degree provide direct access to the labor market

Percentage

21

34 51 47

36

53

0 10 20 30 40 50 60

illiterate Pre-school & read/write Elementary IntermediarySecondary University

Figure 14: Employment to population ratio by attained education level ( 15 years +)

Only 53% of the

population of Lebanon

aged 15 years and above

holding university degree

are in employment, the

remaining are either

inactive or unemployed.

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Illiteracy in Lebanon

24% of households had at least one household member identified as being illiterate and 7% had more than one.

Illiteracy is calculated for persons aged 10 years and above.

In 2009, survey results showed that 16% of women were illiterate while only 8% of men were illiterate. However above primary level Figure 16: Illiterate house-

hold members

two persons 6%

None 76%

one person 17%

Three persons and more 4%

source: MICS 3 survey - 2009 - CAS

Figure 17: Educational attainment of population aged 25 and over

(in percentage)

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

16 25 24 18 17

8 32 25 16 20

Percentage

Women Men

Illitrate

Up to primary (ISCED0 -1) Lower secondary (ISCED2) *

Upper -Secondary (ISCED3 -4) Tertiary (ISCED 5 -6)

* The lower secondary figure is for those who have ‘at most’ lower secondary attainment and includes those who may be illiterate or do not go beyond primary school

Illiteracy rate for women was twice that for men

Percentage 21

9 6

7

43 23

9 6

7 12

0 10 20 30 40 50

General & corporate managers

Specialists Intermediate professions Office clerks Sevices workers & salesperson

Agricultural, Drivers, Skilled and unskilled workers and armed forces

source: Living conditions survey - 2007 - CAS

Figure 15: people with University degree by occupation

In general household’s

members who held a

university degree had higher

level jobs such as specialists,

general and corporate

managers or intermediate

professions, those accounted

for 78% of persons with

university degree.

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Lebanon Compared to neighbouring countries

This section is dedicated to comparing Lebanon to selected Mediterranean countries; it is based on the EUROSTAT publication, which provided comparable figures. Data used in this section are extracted from the ‘Pocketbook on Euro-Mediterranean statistics, 2011 edition, available at the following link: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/product_

details/publication?p_product_code=KS-32-11-802

Figure 18: Educational attainment of population aged 25 and over (in percentage) in 2009

Percentage

Egypt Morocco Lebanon Palestinian

territory Syria

Illitrate

Up to primary (ISCED 0 -1) Lower secondary (ISCED 2)*

Upper -Secondary (ISCED 3 -4) Tertiary (ISCED 5 -6)

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

41.4 9.7

9.3

8.1 7.5 5.6

8.5

10.4

48.1

11.7 28.2 24.4 17.3

18.2 19.5

15.7

14.8 12.7

46.4

20.5 17.1

39.6 23.7

13.4

* The lower secondary figure is for those who have ‘at most’ lower secondary attainment and includes those who may be illiterate or do not go beyond primary school

source: EUROSTAT

Table 4: Adult (15 years and above) Literacy rates in 2007

Algeria Egypt Jordan Lebanon Syria Tunisia

64.1 57.8 88.4 86 78 68.1

81.4 74.6 95.7 93.4 91.7 85.3

72.8 66.4 92.1 89.6 85.2 76.6 Total Women

*Algeria, Egypt, Syria and Tunisia 2006

Men

source: EUROSTAT

*

Table 5: Youth (15 - 24 years) Literacy rates in 2007

Algeria Egypt Jordan Lebanon Syria Tunisia

Total Women

*Algeria, Egypt, Syria and Tunisia 2006

Men 89.2 81.8 98.1 99.1 94.6 94.9

94.4 87.9 98.4 98.4 96.6 97.9

91.8 84.9 98.3 98.7 95.7 96.4

source: EUROSTAT

*

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Glossary and classification used in this publication

• Multiple Indicators Cluster Survey, round 3 (MICS3), Central Administration of Statistics in collaboration with UNICEF, Lebanon, 2009. Survey results are available at the following web: http://www.cas.gov.lb/index.

php?option=com_content&view=article&id=108&Itemid=115

• Living Conditions Survey, Central Administration of Statistics in collaboration with ILO, UNDP and MOSA, Lebanon 2007. Survey results are available at the following link: http://cas.gov.lb/index.php?option=com_cont ent&view=article&id=115&Itemid=2

• Living Conditions Survey, Central Administration of Statistics in collaboration with UNDP and MOSA, Lebanon 2004-2005. Survey results are available at the following link: http://www.cas.gov.lb/index.

php?option=com_content&view=article&id=108&Itemid=115

Data sources

Glossary for vocational and technical education

CAP BP SP BT TS LT LET

Private certificates

ﺔﻴﻨﻬﳌﺍ ﺓﺀﺎﻔﻜﻟﺍ ﺔﻴﻨﻬﳌﺍ ﺔﻴﻠﻴﻤﻜﺘﻟﺍ ﺔﻴﻨﻬﳌﺍ ﺔﻳﻮﻧﺎﺜﻟﺍ ﺔﻴﻨﻔﻟﺍ ﺎﻳﺭﻮﻟﺎﻜﺒﻟﺍ ﻲﻨﻔﻟﺍ ﺯﺎﻴﺘﻣﻻﺍ ﺔﻴﻨﻔﻟﺍ ﺓﺯﺎﺟﻻﺍ ﺔﻴﻨﻔﻟﺍ ﺔﻴﻤﻴﻠﻌﺘﻟﺍ ﺓﺯﺎﺟﻻﺍ ﺔﺻﺎﳋﺍ ﺕﺍﺩﺎﻓﻻﺍ Total

ISCED: International Standard Classification of Education: Designed by UNESCO to serve as an instrument for assembling, compiling and presenting statistics of education both within individual countries and internationally.

More details can be found at the following link: http://www.unesco.org/education/information/nfsunesco/

doc/isced_1997.htm

Employment –to population ratio: Is the ratio of employed persons to total population with same age groups, it is calculated according the the following formula:

Employment – to population ratio 15 years & above = Employed 15 years & above

*

¹⁰⁰

Population 15 years & above

ISCED classification of levels of education

Level 0 - Pre-primary education

Level 1 - Primary education or first stage of basic education Level 2 - Lower secondary or second stage of basic education Level 3 - (Upper) secondary education