More than one in every three students who graduated in 2022 obtained a degree in a field of study related to business, administration or law.
Such subjects, which range from accounting to management, marketing and law degrees, proved to be the most popular among the 2022 cohort of tertiary education graduates, data published on Friday indicated.
A whopping 1,894 students, or 34.6% of the entire cohort, graduated with degrees in such fields of study, making it almost twice as popular as the next-most popular subjects, which were related to health and welfare.
A total of 15.4% of graduates attained a qualification in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).
Of these, 597 were men while 247 were females. Female STEM graduates increased by 2.9% over the previous year, while male STEM graduates decreased by 1.8%.
Fewer graduates
While there was a significant increase in the number of foreign graduates who obtained a tertiary qualification in Malta in 2022, the overall total number of graduates actually declined by 2.2% when compared to the previous year.
Tertiary-level graduates totalled 5,472, the National Statistics Office said.
Foreign graduates totalled 1,359, equivalent to 24.8% of all tertiary-level graduates - a 10.6 percentage point increase over the previous year. EU citizens (other than Maltese) comprised the largest proportion of all foreign tertiary graduates (57.8%).
More than half of tertiary graduates (55.6%) were women. Women surpassed men in all levels of tertiary education except for ISCED 8 (PhD equivalent). The majority of tertiary-level graduates were aged between 20 and 29 years (72%).
The NSO said largest share of tertiary graduates attained a qualification at ISCED Level 6 (Bachelor’s or equivalent) (58.5%). This was followed by 33.1% of total tertiary graduates who attained a qualification at ISCED Level 7 (Master’s or equivalent).
Most students - 74.4% followed a full-time programme.
The NSO data compiles information related to graduates of institutions such as the University of Malta, MCAST, Institute of Tourism Studies and other such institutions offering qualifications at ISCED levels 5 to 8.
In total, there were 30 such educational institutions in 2022, up from 23 in the previous year.