Education and science

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In focus

Paths and transitions in compulsory education

90.3% of the approx. 67 000 pupils who started the third year of primary school in 2012 completed a linear course of six successive school years or possibly an accelerated course by skipping one school year.

Study intensity and mobility

Last year UIT and UTE students achieved an average intensity of study of around 80%. Almost four percent of them were mobile within Switzerland.

The main figures

Description of the infografic

People in education, in 2018/19, in thousands
• Compulsory education: 954,8
• Upper secondary level: 363,0
• Advanced professional education and training: 60,6
• Higher education institutions: 252,5

Teaching staff, in 2017/18, and higher education staff, in 2019, in thousands
• Compulsory education: 99,5
• Higher education institutions: 95,7
• Upper secondary level: 34,7
• Colleges of higher vocational education and training: 7,0

Diplomas, in 2019, in thousands
• Upper secondary level
    Vocational education and training: 68,0
    General education: 42,6
• Tertiary level
    Advanced professional education and training: 27,6
    Higher education institutions
        -Bachelor: 32,3
          -Master: 19,2
          -Doctorate: 4,3

Educational expenditure, in 2017
• Educational public expenditure: 38,1 bn
        Share of the gross domestic product: 5,7%

Research and development (R&D), in 2017
• Expenditure on R&D, in Switzerland: 22,6 bn
         of which business entreprises: 69%
• R&D personnel in the business entreprises (full-time equivalents): 49 353

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